'Bali Nine' pair among eight

executed for drug offences in

Indonesia
Australians Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumuran among eight executed
as high-level campaign for clemency failed to sway Indonesian president

Australians Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan, Filipina Mary Jane Veloso and Nigerian Martin Anderson.
Bottom row from left: Nigerians Raheem Agbaje Salami, Silvester Obiekwe Nwolise, Brazilian Rodrigo Gularte,
and Frenchman Serge Atlaoui. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images/AFP/Getty Images

Michael Saf in Sydney and Dina Indrasaf in Cilicap-Tuesday 28 April 2015

The Indonesian government has executed eight people for drug offences, including
two Australians, Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumuran, who were the subject of a
years-long campaign for clemency.
The development marks the end of years of campaigning to spare the men, who were
sentenced to death in 2006 for their part in the Bali Nine heroin-smuggling ring.
Also executed were four Nigerians, a Brazilian and an Indonesian. All had
beenconvicted of drug crimes.

A ninth prisoner scheduled to face the firing squad, Philippines woman Mary Jane
Veloso, received a last-minute temporary reprieve.
Hundreds had gathered at the port of Cilacap on Tuesday to watch lawyers and
families make their final visits to the prisoners.
Police were forced to use dogs to clear the heavy media pack when Chans and
Sukumarans visibly distressed relatives arrived. Sukumarans sister, Brintha,
collapsed in the mele and had to be carried into the port office by her father, Sam.
Speaking after their visit, Sukumarans brother, Chinthu, again urged Indonesia to
show mercy. Please dont let my mum and my sister have to bury my brother, he
said. Through tears, his mother, Raji, said: I wont see my son again and they are
going to take him tonight and shoot him and he is healthy and he is beautiful and he
has a lot of compassion for other people.
Please president, please dont kill him today. Please dont. Call off the execution.
Please dont kill my son. Please dont.
Chans brother, Andrew, said the family had gone through torture. I saw today
something that no other family should ever have to go to. Nine families inside a prison
saying goodbye to their loved ones, he said. There has to be a moratorium on the
death penalty, no family should endure it. Because now the family is going to have a
grieving process for the rest of their life.
Angela Muxfeldt, cousin of the Brazilian, Rodrigo Gularte, said in the hours before his
execution the 42-year-old was the calmest she had seen him in three months. He is
calm. He doesnt want I cry and doesnt believe execution will happen, she said,
visibly emotional.
Lawyers for Gularte were still lodging an appeal on Tuesday, claiming he suffered from
schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and had been unfit to stand trial when sentenced to
death for cocaine smuggling in 2005.
Chan and Sukumaran, too, have outstanding legal challenges, including a
constitutional appeal on 12 May to a presidential decision in January to deny them
clemency, reportedly made without having even reviewed their files.
The others to be executed who were executed were Raheem Agbaje Salami (also
known as Jamiu Owolabi Abashin), Silvester Obiekwe Nwolise, Martin Anderson and
Okwuduli Oyatanze.
Veloso, who was arrested in Yogyakarta in 2010 with 2.6kg of heroin in her suitcase,
was granted a stay of execution, after the woman she claims set her up voluntarily
surrendered to police on Tuesday.
Maria Kristina Sergio, who was wanted for human trafficking and illegal recruitment in
relation to the Veloso case, handed herself into police in the Philippines province of
Nueva Ecija on Tuesday morning.
Veloso claims that Sergio enticed her to Malaysia with a job offer, where an associate

known as Ike bought her a new suitcase and instructed her to run an errand to
Indonesia, where police found the heroin stitched into the lining of her bag. Sergio has
denied this account.
There was a request from the Philippine president regarding the perpetrator whos
suspected of committing human trafficking and surrendered in the Philippines, Tony
Spontana, a spokesman for the Indonesian attorney-general, Muhammad Prasetyo,
said in a text message.
MJ [Mary-Jane] is needed for her testimony.
The remaining eight prisoners were tied to wooden stakes and shot by 12 marksmen,
three of whom carried live rounds. They aimed at crosses marked over the mens
hearts.
Months of high-level diplomatic representations and high-profile campaigns failed to
sway the Indonesian president, Joko Widodo, who has described narcotics as a
national emergency and pledged to clear the countrys death row of drug offenders.
Six people, five of them foreigners, were shot in a first round of executions in January.
Official figures are unreliable, but following these most recent killings, it is estimated
around 33 foreigners remain on death row in Indonesia for drug crimes.
Speaking hours before the executions, Australias foreign minister, Julie Bishop, said
she was deeply disturbed by Indonesias handling of the matter and warned there
will have to be consequences.
Australia has never withdrawn diplomatic staff over an execution of a citizen abroad,
but is reportedly considering all options. The human rights lawyer, Geoffrey Robertson,
QC, called on Tuesday for some of the $600m Australia directs to Indonesia each year
in foreign aid to be redirected to Nepal.
Brazil and the Netherlands withdrew their ambassadors following the January round of
executions, which included their citizens, and Brazil has refused to accept the
credentials of the new Indonesian ambassador.
Plans for Wednesdays executions attracted international condemnation, including
from the UN secretary- general, Ban Ki-Moon, who called on Widodo to urgently
consider declaring a moratorium on capital punishment in Indonesia, with a view
toward abolition.
The Council of Europe secretary- general, Thorbjrn Jagland, had also asked
Indonesia to refrain, calling the death penalty a terrible injustice which can never be
put right.
On Tuesday, Australia, the European Union and France issued a joint statement
asking Indonesia to reflect on the impact [of the executions] on Indonesias position in
a globalised world and an international reputation.
We support Indonesias efforts to obtain forgiveness for its citizens abroad. Stopping
this execution will help those efforts, the statement said.

Vigils were held across Australia for Chan, 31, and Sukumuran, 34, whose cause had
been embraced by the country in their final months. Tarred as thugs for years after
their capture, on death row the pair underwent sincere transformations, Chan
converting to Christianity and Sukumaran emerging as an accomplished artist.
After earlier denying the pair their choice of spiritual counsellors, Indonesian
authorities relented late on Tuesday, allowing pastors Christie Buckingham and David
Soper to attend to the men in the final hours.
Sukumaran continued to paint up until his last day, producing a rendering of human
heart signed by each nine of the prisoners who were scheduled to be shot in the early
hours of Wednesday. It was titled, One heart, one feeling in love.
Posted by Thavam