Militant sentenced to death over Australian Embassy blast

An Indonesian militant was today sentenced to death for helping plan and carry out last year’s suicide bombing at the Australian Embassy.

Iwan Darmawan, also known as Rois, said he would appeal against the verdict. He has always denied any involvement in the September 9, 2004, attack in Jakarta that killed 10 people.

“The defendant Iwan Darmawan alias Rois and his friends were seriously involved in the planning of the attack by buying explosives and assembling the bomb,” Judge Rocki Panjaitan told the South Jakarta District Court.

Darmawan is the most senior of six people arrested in connection with the attack, which killed 10 people and wounded nearly 200.

Three have already been sentenced to prison terms of between three-and -a-half and seven years.

Police have blamed the attack on the regional terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, which is also linked to the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people, mostly foreign tourists, and a 2003 blast at Jakarta's Marriott hotel that killed 12.