NUSAKAMBANGAN, INDONESIA - AN Islamic militant on death row over the 2002 nightclub bombings on the Indonesian holiday island of Bali pledged 'retribution' Wednesday if his execution goes ahead.

Amrozi, 47, and fellow militants Mukhlas and Imam Samudra face a firing squad over the attacks which killed 202 mainly foreign holidaymakers.

'I am executed, later there will be retribution,'Amrozi told reporters at the Nusakambangan island prison at an event marking the Eid al-Fitr holiday at the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Earlier plans to execute the bombers before Ramadan were shelved over a delay in paperwork. A revised date for the execution has not been set.

The bombers are mounting a legal challenge to the use of firing squads to carry out the death penalty, saying shooting constitutes torture. The bombers have said they would prefer to be beheaded.

Denouncing Indonesian authorities as 'satanic forces', fellow bomber Mukhlas said: 'The people who will execute us, if they do this execution they will be cursed by God.'

'If the execution is carried out, that will constitute the biggest criminal act because they will be killing holy warriors,' Mukhlas said.

Turning to a group of foreign journalists, a visibly enraged Mukhlas pointed and yelled 'you are infidels' before being taken by a guard back to his cell.

Asked by a journalist if he would ask for forgiveness from the families of Western victims, third bomber Imam Samudra said: 'I don't ask for forgiveness from infidels, I only ask for forgiveness from Muslims.'

Asking for forgiveness for one's past sins is a tradition during Eid in Indonesia.

'I don't have, and will never have, regrets,' said Samudra, dressed in a white, flowing robe. The others agreed and praised other attacks, including the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan, by militants that killed at least 54 people and wounded hundreds.

Amrozi said he planned to take a third wife if his execution did not go ahead.

'If I live a long life, I want to marry again because (in Islam) it is acceptable to have four wives,' he said.

Amrozi, who remarried his first wife by proxy in May, refused to say who his next bride would be.

Australian Brian Deegan, whose son Josh died in the bombings, said the men have never shown signs of remorse.

'That evidently has not changed,' Mr Deegan said from Adelaide, Australia. 'Their actions are abhorrent and despicable and misguided. They took away the lives of many men, women and children in a futile effort to make a point.'

Indonesian authorities normally allow news media to meet prison inmates during the end of Ramadan feasting celebration.

The Bali attacks - allegedly funded by al-Qaida - were carried out by members of Jemaah Islamiyah, a Southeast Asian militant group blamed for at least three other suicide bombings in Indonesia since then, though none has occurred since 2005.

The group has been largely dismantled across the region, with its leaders dead or in prison. -- AFP