Families of Death Row Inmates, Fearing Worst, Head to Indonesia

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Relatives and diplomats rushed to an Indonesian prison island on Friday ahead of the looming executions of nine foreign drug convicts who are set to be shot in defiance of international anger. 

Indonesia advised consular officials to go to Nusakambangan, the high-security prison island where its executions are carried out, and where all of the death row convicts are now congregated. 

The foreigners -- two from Australia, one each from Brazil, France and the Philippines, and four from Africa -- have all lost appeals for clemency from President Joko Widodo, who argues that Indonesia is fighting a drugs emergency.

Widodo has turned a deaf ear to increasingly clamorous appeals on the convicts' behalf from their governments, from social media and from others such as Anggun, one of Indonesia's most famous singers. 

France has accused Indonesia of "serious dysfunction" in its legal system that led to Frenchman Serge Atlaoui being sentenced to death, and said his execution would be "incomprehensible".

Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop tried calling her Indonesian opposite number Friday, but he was too busy to take her call, her department said, adding that it was "gravely concerned" at developments.

Mary Jane Veloso, a Filipino maid whose two sons aged 12 and six have come to spend her final hours with her, was transferred Friday morning under heavy police guard to Nusakambangan, sparking protests in Manila.

#MaryJane was trending strongly on Twitter in Indonesia, as was #SaveMaryJaneVeloso in the Philippines, in support of a woman who says a friend stashed heroin in her suitcase without her knowledge.

"We've learned that she's been moved but I still believe God will give us a miracle, As long as she's still alive, we will never lose hope," Veloso's mother, Celia, said on Philippine TV station ANC.

Indonesia's Human Rights Commission released a letter from Veloso, written by hand in the Bahasa Indonesia language to Widodo, in which she pleads for mercy for the sake of her young children.

Jakarta said an exact date for the executions could not be decided yet, as a judicial review was still pending for the sole Indonesian in the group of 10 people who face death by firing squad.

 

- Agonising wait - 

A spokesman for Indonesia's Supreme Court told Agence France Presse a ruling on that case could be made as early as Monday, paving the way for the executions to proceed.

"We hope that the decision will be made as soon as possible so that we will have a chance to determine the D-Day of the executions," Tony Spontana, spokesman for Indonesia’s attorney-general, told reporters.

"The theme of the impending executions is a war against drugs," he stressed, while indicating that more than the legally required minimum notice period of 72 hours might be given to the foreign embassies.

Chinthu Sukumaran, whose brother Myuran is one of the two Australians in the group on death row, was making last-minute arrangements to leave for Jakarta.

"I can't believe this is it. We still haven't given up hope," he told the Sydney Morning Herald.

Michael Chan, whose brother Andrew faces death too as a fellow ringleader of the "Bali Nine" heroin trafficking gang, was also heading to Indonesia, the newspaper said.

Consular staff assisting a Brazilian convict were told by Indonesian authorities to be in Cilacap, the port town nearest Nusakambangan, on Saturday. 

One of the convicts was previously identified by the Indonesian government as Ghanaian, but Spontana said he was in fact from Nigeria, along with three other Nigerians in the group.

Veloso's lawyers on Friday filed another court bid to halt the process, as the Australians' lawyers have been doing. 

But all the lawyers concede that such attempts are long shots. Indonesia says all judicial reviews and appeals for clemency have been exhausted, and that the legal manoeuvres amount to delaying tactics.

"Maybe, the best we can hope for is a commutation of the death sentence," Philippine foreign affairs spokesman Charles Jose told reporters in Manila.

Veloso's plight has been keenly felt in the Philippines, where around 100 protesters carrying "Save the life of Mary Jane" signs in Bahasa Indonesia picketed Jakarta's embassy in Manila on Friday.

"Mary Jane doesn't have that much time. The (Philippine) government must show determination to save her from death row," Garry Martinez of the emigrants support group Migrante told AFP.

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