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Bali bombers set to die after court nixes appeals

The Indonesia Supreme Court rejected appeals by all three Islamic militants on death row for the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, the state news agency said Monday.
/ Source: The Associated Press

The Indonesia Supreme Court rejected appeals by all three Islamic militants on death row for the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, the state news agency said Monday.

Supreme Court spokesman Nurhadi said Monday two separate panels of judges had ruled against Ali Ghufron and Imam Samudra — on Aug. 23 and Sept. 19 respectively — because their lawyers provided no new evidence countering earlier verdicts, Antara state news agency reported.

The court has announced earlier this month that it has also rejected an appeal by a third Bali bomber convict on death row, Amrozi Nurhasyim, on Aug. 30.

Lawyers for the three men, awaiting a firing squad for the twin nightclub attacks, argued that the convictions were illegal because they were based on an anti-terror law that was applied retroactively.

"Their appeals were rejected," Nurhadi said, "They will face capital punishment."

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, has been hit by a string of terrorist attacks in recent years blamed on the al Qaida-linked militant group Jemaah Islamiyah, the first and most deadly being the Oct. 12, 2002, bombings on the resort island of Bali.

3 said they wanted to die as martyrs
The three are among more than 30 people convicted in those blasts. They confessed to participating in the plot and initially accepted their death sentences, saying they wanted to die as martyrs.

But in July, they asked their lawyers to appeal, noting that the Constitutional Court ruled in mid-2004 that tough new laws — passed after the Bali bombings — could not be used in cases predating their adoption.

In the Antara report late Monday, Nurhadi did not explain why the Supreme Court had allowed retroactive use of the anti-terror law.

It was not immediately clear whether the three convicts have any further legal options to fight their death sentence.