Indonesia executes 4 drug offenders; Indian spared

Jakarta: Indian convict Gurdip Singh, who was convicted along with 13 others for drug trafficking, was not among the four executed by Indonesia on Thursday.

India is in touch with the Indonesian leadership to get clemency for Gurdip Singh. Indian embassy officials in Jakarta were trying to ensure that all legal recourse is exhausted before the death penalty is carried out against Singh. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Thursday night said the Indian government was making last minute efforts to save Singh. “Afdhal Muhammad, the legal representative of Gurdip Singh was of the view that he can file for presidential clemency under the relevant law before the President of the Republic of Indonesia,” External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup said in his weekly media briefing in New Delhi on Thursday. “The embassy sent a note verbale to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Indonesia requesting that all legal recourse should be exhausted before the death penalty is carried out,” he said.

Singh was arrested on August 29, 2004, at the Soekarno Hatta Airport in Jakarta on charges of drug trafficking, for attempting to carry 300 grams of heroin.

The Tangerang Court awarded him capital punishment in February 2005 against the prosecutors’ request for 20 years imprisonment. Swarup said that Singh’s appeal against the death penalty was turned down by the High Court of Banten in May 2005.

The four executed on Thursday included three Africans. Muhammad Rum, spokesman for Indonesia’s attorney general, told reporters outside the Nusakambangan prison that authorities have not decided when 10 other prisoners will be executed by firing squad. Pakistan was also in touch with top officials in Indonesia to halt the imminent execution of Pakistani national Zulfiqar Ali for drug smuggling.

Indonesia rebuffed appeals from distraught relatives, rights advocates and foreign governments to abandon plans to execute 14 people.

Global appeal to stop executions: The European Union and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights called on Indonesia to impose an immediate moratorium on executions and the Indian and Pakistani governments said they were making urgent efforts to save two nationals among the condemned. Indonesia rebuffed appeals from distraught relatives, rights advocates and foreign governments to abandon plans to execute 14 people, including an Indian, for drug crimes as preparations intensified at the prison island holding death row inmates.

A convoy of ambulances, most of them carrying coffins, arrived Thursday morning at the port town nearest to the Nusa Kambangan prison island, where the mostly foreign drug convicts will be executed by firing squads. Lawyers and rights groups have raised serious doubts about the legitimacy of the convictions in several of the drug cases.