Jakarta Globe, May 28, 2015
Riau Police caught a truck driver attempting to smuggle eight tons of marijuana from Aceh to Jakarta and Bandung last October. (Reuters Photo/Andres Stapff) |
Jakarta. An
Indonesian court has sentenced a truck driver to death for transporting eight
tons of marijuana, as part of the government’s crusade against what the
president claims is a “national drug emergency.”
The court
in Riau province, in Sumatra, ruled on Thursday that the defendant, M. Jamil,
was guilty of attempting to smuggle the drugs overland from Aceh province, on
the northern tip of Sumatra, to Jakarta and Bandung in Java last year.
Jamil was
arrested in Riau’s Siak district with his truck loaded with sacks of marijuana.
He said the contraband had been ordered by a man identified as Ibrahim, who was
later also arrested and sentenced to death.
Jamil’s
arrest last October was not his first brush with the law. He was caught
smuggling marijuana several years ago but managed to evade the death sentence.
After
serving time in prison, he was released and immediately returned to
transporting the drug.
The court
also sentenced two of Jamil’s accomplices to life in prison, and another man
identified as Muhalil to 20 years in prison.
Jamil told
the court that he would not appeal against the death sentence.
The ruling
comes a month after Indonesia executed eight men, seven of them foreign
nationals, for drug-trafficking offenses. Indonesia has so far this year put to
death 14 people, 12 of them foreigners, for drug offenses, drawing widespread
international condemnation.
President
Joko Widodo, in defending the use of the death penalty, claims that Indonesia
is in the grip of a “drug emergency,” and that the death sentence serves as a
deterrent against would-be drug offenders. Experts, though, have repeatedly
debunked the figures Joko cites for drug-related deaths.
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