Bali Nine pair lodge handwritten appeals

Andrew Chan, Myuran Sukumaran

Bali: Australian drug smugglers Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan have lodged handwritten letters to Indonesia's president appealing for mercy as part of an application to have their death sentences reviewed.

In their letters written in Indonesian, Chan admits he deserves to be in jail but says he can be rehabilitated, while Sukumaran insists prison has changed him into an extraordinary and good man.

In his statement to President Joko Widodo and the Supreme Court chairman, Chan writes that life in prison is tough but he is not complaining, "because I know I deserved to be jailed for quite a long time".

He begs for the president and court to note his rehabilitation during his decade on death row.

"I'm like a broken cup, but that doesn't mean I can't be repaired," he writes.

Sukumaran's letter begins by apologising for a crime committed when he was "very young and foolish and uneducated".

He writes about the computer and art classes in Kerobokan jail and how, through teaching others, they have taught him.

"In a way, Bapak [Indonesian for Sir], I would like to thank you even though I'm in prison," Sukumaran writes.

"If the lowest point of a society is prison, then it must be noted that your prison has changed me into an extraordinary person, a good man, an educated man."

The Bali Nine ringleaders, who have been on death row in Kerobokan prison for 10 years, were unable to apply for the judicial review in person, so a court registrar visited them.

With their last-ditch application accepted, their legal team hopes arguments about their rehabilitation and past misapplications of law can be considered.

They want the Australians' death sentences to be commuted to 20 years in jail.

Legal uncertainty over whether the courts can hear a second judicial review, known as a PK, persists.

Attorney-General spokesman Tony Spontana told reporters the application for PK won't stop plans for the men's executions.

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Source: The Sydney Morning Herald, Gabrielle Dunlevy, January 31, 2015

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