Indonesia to execute drug traffickers
Nine foreigners, one Indonesian citizen given notice
JAKARTA, Indonesia – Indonesia’s attorney general’s office notified nine foreigners and an Indonesian convicted of drug trafficking that their executions will be carried out within days, ignoring appeals by the U.N. chief and foreign leaders to spare them.
Authorities asked the 10 convicts – four Nigerian men, two Australian men, a Filipino woman, and one man each from Brazil, France and Indonesia – for their last wish, the spokesman for the attorney general, Tony Spontana, said today.
He said the legal options of nine of them have been exhausted, while Frenchman Serge Atlaoui still has an outstanding legal complaint over the procedure followed in his request for clemency. Spontana said he expects the Supreme Court to rule on it Monday.
The 72-hour notice indicates the executions by firing squad in Besi prison on Nusakambangan Island will be carried out at the earliest on Tuesday or Wednesday.
The pending executions have caused an international outcry, particularly in Australia, France and the Philippines, which are opposed to the death penalty.
U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo to “urgently consider declaring a moratorium on capital punishment in Indonesia, with a view toward abolition.”
French President Francois Hollande has warned of diplomatic consequences if Atlaoui is executed, and said Saturday that there could be possible economic fallout as well.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, whose government has been pressuring Indonesia to spare the two Australians, arrived on a visit to Paris on Saturday night and was expected to discuss the situation with Hollande.
Australian heroin traffickers Andrew Chan, 31, and Myuran Sukumaran, 33, were the ringleaders of a gang of nine Australians arrested in April 2005, while trying to smuggle more than 18 pounds of heroin from the resort island of Bali to Sydney.
Indonesia has extremely strict drug laws and often executes smugglers. More than 130 people are on death row, mostly for drug crimes. About a third of them are foreigners.