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Indonesia | 14 years on death row: Timeline of Mary Jane Veloso’s ordeal and fight for justice

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MANILA, Philippines — The case of Mary Jane Veloso, a Filipina on death row in Indonesia for drug trafficking, has spanned over a decade and remains one of the most high-profile legal battles involving an overseas Filipino worker. Veloso was arrested on April 25, 2010, at Adisucipto International Airport in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, after she was found in possession of more than 2.6 kilograms of heroin. She was sentenced to death in October – just six months after her arrest. Indonesia’s Supreme Court upheld the penalty in May 2011.

Saudi Arabia Urged To Halt Imminent Executions

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Two UN human rights experts on Wednesday urged Saudi Arabia to stop the imminent execution of three foreign nationals, with Riyadh having executed more than 300 people this year -- a record tally.

Four more people were put to death on Tuesday: three people convicted of drug smuggling and another convicted of murder, the official Saudi Press Agency reported, citing the interior ministry.

That brought the total number of executions for the year so far to 303, according to an AFP tally based on state media reports.

The Gulf kingdom had enacted the death penalty 200 times by the end of September, indicating a rapid rate of executions in recent weeks.

The two UN special rapporteurs said three Egyptians were executed on Tuesday -- and two Egyptian nationals and a Jordanian are due to be executed imminently, they added.

"Saudi Arabia seems to have lifted a previously announced unofficial moratorium, in 2021, on the use of death penalty for drug-related offences in the country," the experts said in a statement.

"Executions of foreign nationals appear to be increasingly taking place without prior notification to death row inmates, their families, or their legal representatives.

“Foreign nationals are often in a situation of vulnerability, and need specific measures be taken to ensure they have access to their legal safeguards from the moment of arrest, during interrogations, and throughout judicial proceedings."

Saudi Arabia has executed 113 foreigners this year, according to an AFP tally -- another record -- most of them on drug-related charges.

Edwards and Tidball-Binz voiced concern that foreign nationals made up around 75 percent of all executions for drug crimes this year, and said trials were apparently falling short of international standards of fairness and due process.

"The execution of sentenced persons whose guilt has not been established beyond reasonable doubt constitutes an arbitrary deprivation of life," they said.

The experts called on Riyadh to take immediate steps to abolish the death penalty for crimes outside intentional killing.

Source: Agence France-Presse, Staff, December 4, 2024

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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde



Location: Saudi Arabia
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