CILACAP, Indonesia (AFP) — More foreign drug convicts could imminently face the firing squad in Indonesia after authorities said Monday they were ready to carry out a new round of executions following a hiatus.
Nationals from Pakistan, Nigeria and Zimbabwe are expected to be put to death alongside Indonesians soon, but officials say no Europeans or Australians will face the firing squad in the third round of executions under President Joko Widodo.
Indonesia sparked international outrage with its last batch of executions in April 2015 when it put to death seven foreigners, including two Australians, but Widodo has insisted Jakarta is fighting a war against drugs and traffickers must be harshly punished.
Authorities began stepping up preparations in recent days. A Pakistani drug convict was transferred Monday to Nusakambangan prison island off Java, where executions take place, and Indonesian authorities have notified Pakistani officials his execution is imminent.
An Indonesian woman sentenced to death for drugs was transferred to the island at the weekend.
Security was tight Monday around Cilacap, the port city on Java island that serves as a gateway to Nusakambangan, with many police officers deployed and access for visitors closed for the coming week.
“All the preparations have been made,” said Molyanto, prisons head in Central Java province, who like many Indonesians goes by one name.
Neither Molyanto nor the attorney-general’s office, which oversees executions, would confirm when the convicts would face the firing squad or who would be put to death.
The office previously said that executions would resume after the Muslim Eid holiday, which fell at the start of July.
Pakistani deputy ambassador in Jakarta, Syed Zahid Raza, said his embassy was notified by the Indonesian foreign ministry Friday that the Pakistani man, Zulfiqar Ali, would be executed in the near future.
“The embassy of Pakistan has approached all the concerned high officials to convince them that it was not a fair trial for Mr. Zulfiqar,” he said in a statement. Rights groups have claimed Ali, sentenced to death in 2005 for heroin possession, was beaten into confessing.
A Filipina, Mary Jane Veloso, who was pulled from the last executions will not be included in the upcoming round as a legal process related to her case is ongoing in the Philippines, said the attorney-general’s spokesman Mohammad Rum.
Several Europeans on death row in Indonesia for drug offences look set to escape the looming executions, including Frenchman Serge Atlaoui and British grandmother Lindsay Sandiford.
Indonesia — which has some of the toughest anti-drugs laws in the world — executed 14 drug convicts, mostly foreigners, in two batches last year.
The second round caused the most serious diplomatic tensions, with Canberra temporarily recalling its ambassador from Jakarta due to the execution of the Australian drug smugglers, Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran.
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