Howard faces politics' toughest test

By GREG ANSLEY

This is the worst of times for Australian Prime Minister John Howard.

David Stewart, a countryman in shorts and Akubra hat, has just shouted down an American journalist: "Hang on mate, give it a go mate, please, please ... sorry mate."

Howard silences the American, and turns to listen to Stewart.

"My son Anthony is missing. He's six foot four, he's got capped teeth, he's got an arm reconstruction and he has an appendix missing.

"How long before my wife and my family can bring him home ... Why can't we go and see him?"

Howard, lowering his voice in a hushed Bali press conference, can give no answers.

"Sir, I would love to be able to give you a precise time. I can't."

Minutes earlier another man, looking for a missing 20-year-old niece, had called a similar plea from the rear of the Australian press centre in Kuta's Hard Rock Hotel.

"We want to take her home," he says. "We are hurting. We are really hurting. We want help."

Only blocks from the site of the bomb that ended more than 180 lives and which has left 114 Australians still missing, Howard is facing politics' toughest test. It is not easy.

Howard has sent troops to war in East Timor and Afghanistan, and probably will again in Iraq.

But in Bali he is facing the anguish of parents and relatives of young innocents killed by malice.

The bodies cannot go home yet, until identity is confirmed by dental records and DNA . In the meantime, Howard has promised to pay airfares and accommodation for close relatives, and for the repatriation of bodies when they are released.

It is an agonising time for a politician who is above all a family man.

On Thursday, he flew to Bali for a sunset memorial service outside the gates of the Australian consulate, where about 150 relatives, many mourning lost children, listen to Howard try to articulate the sorrow of a nation.

Words are inadequate, he says, for "the anguish that people are feeling ... the sense of bewilderment and disbelief that so many young lives, with so much before them, should have been taken away in such blind fury and violence".

Afterward, as they place candles at the foot of a large wooden cross, many men and women fall sobbing into a white-faced Howard's embrace, or touch his arm as they pass.One of Howard's entourage cannot contain his tears; others look away, swallowing.

Howard has not finished for the night.

At the end of the ceremony he stays on with the families.

At the press conference, he is asked how the service affected him.

"I can't adequately explain to you the compassion I felt toward the people, the anger I felt that not only young, but predominantly young, Australians died," he says.

"They always felt that they could travel freely and widely ... and for as long as possible.

"But nothing that I felt could go anywhere near meeting the depth of feeling, of loss and despair of those who have been affected."

As the conference ends, Howard heads for a briefing where he has promised relatives to stay as long as they have questions or views to express.

Bali messages and latest information on New Zealanders
New Zealand travellers in Bali, and their families around the world, can exchange news via our Bali Messages page. The page also contains lists of New Zealanders in Bali and their condition.

Foreign Affairs advice to New Zealanders

* Travellers should defer travel to Bali

* NZers in Bali should keep a low profile and remain calm

* Foreign Affairs Hotline: 0800 432 111

Feature: Bali bomb blast

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