Indonesia has executed eight out of nine drug convicts by firing squad despite last-ditch appeals by Australia’s foreign minister for a stay of execution so that claims of corruption during the trials of two Australian prisoners could be investigated.
The executions were carried out after midnight (17:30 GMT) at Besi prison on Nusakambangan Island, yesterday, after the inmates were given 72-hour notice.
Over the weekend, authorities had asked the nine inmates, which included two Australians, four Nigerian men, one man each from Brazil and Indonesia and a Filipino woman for their last wishes.
However, the execution of the Filipina, Mary Jane Veloso, was delayed at the last minute after one of her recruiters surrendered to police in the Philippines, the attorney general’s spokesman told newsmen late yesterday.
“The execution of Mary Jane Veloso has been postponed because there was a request from the Philippine president related to a perpetrator suspected of human trafficking who surrendered herself in the Philippines,” Tony Spontana, spokesman for the attorney general said.
“Mary Jane has been asked to testify.”
Earlier, Filipino migrants had rallied in Hong Kong on behalf of Velose – a 30-year-old mother of two whose supporters said was tricked into carrying a suitcase loaded with heroin.
Our source said while there was an outpouring of joy among Filipinos that Velose had been spared, there would be a different reaction from Australia after Jakarta rejected last-ditch pleas for clemency.
“The executions could call a diplomatic fallout between Australia and Indonesia just as they did earlier this year when the Netherlands and Brazil recalled their ambassadors after their nationals were killed,” she said.
Amnesty International condemned the executions, saying they showed a “complete disregard for due process and human rights safeguards.”
Some 14 people have now been put to death in Indonesia this year, and the government has announced plans for further executions this year.
The families of the Australian convicts had paid an anguished final visit to their loved ones, yesterday, wailing in grief as ambulances carrying empty white coffins arrived at the prison. Australia’s Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop, told the media that she had received a letter from Indonesia on Monday night that offered no indication of a reprieve for Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan.
Earlier in the day, Bishop had asked for a stay in their executions, saying allegations in the Australian media that their judges had requested money to commute the death sentences were “very serious”.
Indonesian President, Joko Widodo, said that such concerns should have been conveyed a decade ago when the case went through the courts.
A former lawyer of the prisoners, Muhammad Rifan, told Australia’s Fairfax Media on Monday that Indonesian judges had requested more than $100,000 in return for prison terms of less than 20 years.
But Rifan said the judges later told him they had been ordered by senior legal and government members in Jakarta to impose a death penalty, so the deal fell through.
Sukumaran and Chan were members of the so-called Bali Nine who were arrested at the main airport on the holiday island in April 2005 for trying to smuggle 8.3kg of heroin to Australia.
The Indonesian authorities had been tipped off by Australia’s Federal Police.
The seven other members of the Bali Nine, all Australians, have been jailed in Indonesia but do not face the death penalty.
A spokesman for Indonesia’s Foreign Ministry, Armanatha Nasir, said Sukumaran and Chan had been given all the legal avenues to challenge their death sentences.
The country’s attorney-general’s office said the executions of all nine people on death row would proceed this week.
“I think it will happen this week as the preparations are 100 per cent ready now,” spokesman Tony Spontana said.
The prisoners were handed 72 hours’ notice of their executions on Saturday, when representatives of their countries were also advised. Indonesia usually carries out executions at midnight.
The other seven who were informed at the weekend that they would face the firing squad are four Nigerians, an Indonesian, a Brazilian and a Filipina.
Spontana said a tenth prisoner, the Frenchman Sergei Atlaoui, would be spared for now as legal proceedings were still under way.
Among the condemned was a Brazilian man, Rodrigo Gularte, who has been diagnosed by Indonesian medics with schizophrenia, a mental illness.
Gularte, 42, was arrested in 2004 at a Jakarta airport after trying to enter the country with 6kg of cocaine hidden in a surfboard.
He was also sentenced to death in 2005.
Meanwhile, Chan, got married in the prison on Monday, his brother Michael said after attending the wedding.
The marriage was Chan’s “final wish” granted by Indonesian prison authorities.
“Yes there was a celebration inside the prison this afternoon with close family and friends; it’s obviously a special occasion for them,” Michael said.
“Yes, look, it’s tough time but it’s happy time at the same time. We just hope that the president somewhere will find some compassion and mercy for these two, young couple so they can carry on with their lives.”