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Execute or Rehabilitate Indonesian Style

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Hodgie said:
There have been polls taken over the years which suggest that many Australian's are for capital punishment (some polls showed a result of more than 50% agreeing with this form of punishment). However, this would be saved for the worst types of crimes rather than drug related crimes as in this instance.

When the terrorists were caught for the Bali bombings back in 2002 the Australian public and even the Prime Minister (Howard) at the time supported and expected the death sentence for those individuals because so many Australians were killed. To me this shows that we as a society don't actually disagree with the death penalty we just disagree upon when it should be used.
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The below is extracted from an article written in 2010, you can see how public opinion can change so much on a topic such as the death penalty given a different set of circumstances, you can actually see here that one of the Bali 9 members said back then that we should have been opposed to the Bali Bombers being executed.

Regarding the Bali bombers, John Howard, as prime minister, said that if the death penalty ''is what the law of Indonesia provides, that is how things should proceed''. Such statements undermine Australian arguments against the death penalty for Australians tried in Indonesia and elsewhere.

This has been pointed out by Scott Rush, one of the Bali Nine, who is facing death. He wrote to the government: ''I don't want to be in any way political but, from a practical point of view of someone inside on death row, it makes practical and good sense to have a consistent position of opposing the death penalty without discrimination.''
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Full article; http://www.smh.com.au/federal-polit...-penalty-no-shades-of-grey-20100301-pdgo.html
 
Tink said:
Australians Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran have been executed by firing squad on the Indonesian prison island of Nusakambangan in the early hours of this morning.

They were killed along with six other death row prisoners on Nusakambangan prison island just before 3:30am AEST.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-04-29/andrew-chan-and-myuran-sukumaran-executed-reports/6426654
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May they rest in peace. I sincerely sympathise with the growing anguish and despair they must have felt during the last weeks. For them, the terror has finally ended. May they rest in peace.

May their families find closure, once the media find other victims to drag across our screens.
May the media frenzy stay long enough in some budding drug entrepreneurs' minds to deter them from similar ventures.
May Kate have her baby soon, so the media have other things to talk about.

And last, not least:
May our politicians accept that Australia does not hold the global moral and legal yardstick over every other of the 194 Sovereign States, and get back to focus on what they were elected to do: Govern OUR Country.
 
pixel said:
May they rest in peace. I sincerely sympathise with the growing anguish and despair they must have felt during the last weeks. For them, the terror has finally ended. May they rest in peace.

May their families find closure, once the media find other victims to drag across our screens.
May the media frenzy stay long enough in some budding drug entrepreneurs' minds to deter them from similar ventures.
May Kate have her baby soon, so the media have other things to talk about.

And last, not least:
May our politicians accept that Australia does not hold the global moral and legal yardstick over every other of the 194 Sovereign States, and get back to focus on what they were elected to do: Govern OUR Country.
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Yes, I personally think Abbott has done himself some serious damage, getting caught up in this circus.
 
Just seems a shame seeing as they seemed to have genuinely rehabilitated and had the capacity to help others do the same.
 
wayneL said:
Just seems a shame seeing as they seemed to have genuinely rehabilitated and had the capacity to help others do the same.
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No argument there, Wayne;
From an Australian/ Western perspective, you are correct. The problem is, they committed the crime in Indonesia, a country with different views of the value of an individual life versus rights and demands of the broader community.

There is no point in criticising their legal system. It differs from ours, and that's it. If we don't like theirs, we can either stay away or respect it while there. However, criticising the President of a sovereign country for acting within his boundaries and bringing one's own generosity into the open debate is such a huge diplomatic faux pas that Joko Widodo could never have relented afterwards. He would have completely lost face, the most valuable currency in any Asian country.

PS: As regards "capacity to help others", IW may point out the deterring effect that the broad publicity of the summary execution may have on Indonesians. Similar to Australians crying almost exclusively over the death of two Australians, mostly ignoring the plight of the other 8 that shared the same destiny, the Indonesian President will do what, in his mind and world view, affects the Indonesian people. Whether we agree with him or not is utterly irrelevant to him.
 
I used to be in favour of executions for certain crimes, but hearing this story changed my mind.

It sends chills up my spine to think an innocent man had to not only go through the drama of having his daughters killed, but then get executed for there murder when he was innocent.

 
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No argument from me there Pixel. Aside from the intentionally narrow view expressed, I'm standing aside from the broader debate.

It's a lose-lose.
 
Let me make it quite clear, VC:
I am not defending the death penalty. It clashes with my perception of civility and humanity
I am defending the right of a Sovereign Nation to set its own rules and mete out justice accordingly.

I wonder whether there would be a similar media circus if Christoper Lane's killers were sentenced to death and executed in Oklahoma. Would Tony Abbott remind the US President of our help in Iraq...:1zhelp:
 
What the Indonesians did was not only execute these people,but they tortured them for ten years-with the death sentence hanging over them.
I cannot but think that the triumphalism shown by the current government over the success of the turn back the boats policy put Australia in a no-win situation with Widodo.
I heard Tony Abbott say the he respected Indonesian sovereignty.Well my guess is that the Indonesians think the opposite after Australian warships made quite a few incursions into Indonesian waters.
I think that Julie Bishop is well suited to diplomacy,but the cards were stacked against her from the start.
 
pixel said:
Let me make it quite clear, VC:
I am not defending the death penalty. It clashes with my perception of civility and humanity
I am defending the right of a Sovereign Nation to set its own rules and mete out justice accordingly.

I wonder whether there would be a similar media circus if Christoper Lane's killers were sentenced to death and executed in Oklahoma. Would Tony Abbott remind the US President of our help in Iraq...:1zhelp:
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I agree with you pixel, is this media and political response going to be the norm, from here on?

I don't recall this amount of reaction, when Malaysia executed Chambers and Barlow, a few years back.
 
pixel said:
Let me make it quite clear, VC:
I am not defending the death penalty. It clashes with my perception of civility and humanity

I am defending the right of a Sovereign Nation to set its own rules and mete out justice accordingly.
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I understand that, I was just giving my opinion.

However, at some point the rights of sovereign Nations end, and human rights over rule. eg, we can hardly say that the holocaust was within the rights of Germany as a sovereign nation.
 
pixel said:
May they rest in peace. I sincerely sympathise with the growing anguish and despair they must have felt during the last weeks. For them, the terror has finally ended. May they rest in peace.

May their families find closure, once the media find other victims to drag across our screens.
May the media frenzy stay long enough in some budding drug entrepreneurs' minds to deter them from similar ventures.
May Kate have her baby soon, so the media have other things to talk about.

And last, not least:
May our politicians accept that Australia does not hold the global moral and legal yardstick over every other of the 194 Sovereign States, and get back to focus on what they were elected to do: Govern OUR Country.
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Yea, may they rest in peace.

I personally don't think such crimes as drug smuggling is "worth" the death penalty, but like you said, it's their country and their laws.

Don't know why our political leaders "try" to help them the way they did. You'd think they have a direct line to the Indonesian president, or could send people there and plead or use other diplomatic means... do things behind the scene.

It's impossible to to change people's mind with a bullhorn sitting on your high horse making threats. Sad thing is these politicians knew that.. .guess they just can't help but want their extra 15 minutes of air time.
 
Couple of things

(1) Hypocrisy in Indonesia pleading for the life of their own.

(2) Bribes were offered $130K and you get 20 yrs not the death penalty.

Which leads me to

(3) What happened to the drugs they were caught with
Shapelle Corby's as well for that matter?

Get my drift?
 
I find this news article repulsive.

http://www.news.com.au/…/bali-…/story-fnh81fz8-1227326038120

Yes, the penalty of death was extreme. And yes I feel for their friends and family. But to say the AFP have blood on their hands washes away the fact that these two individuals willfully broke the law knowing full well they could face the death penalty. Nobody knows what these two would be doing today had they not been caught.
All these calls for a boycott of Bali and other stupid ramifications is just a media frenzy.

Much like barely anyone remembers the name Van Tuong Nguyen, so too will the news media forget this in due time.
 
Dua kesalahan tidak menjadi golongan kanan - Two wrongs don't make a right.

Joko Widodo had no where to turn on this one. Release the drug smuggling Australians and be seen as politically weak in his own country and globally. Bit more than just the nine Aussies who got caught smuggling 8.3kg of HEROIN going on in the political landscape of Indonesia by the way.

http://www.news.com.au/world/asia/j...ss-or-corruption/story-fnh81fz8-1227225969978

Jokowi, after weeks of dithering, suspended the nomination but named an interim police chief who is just as dubious. Why did Jokowi make such a bad choice? Was Mr Clean really Mr Dirty? According to Indonesian media, it was at the behest of Megawati. Gunawan had once served as her aide.
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http://www.smh.com.au/comment/indon...orrupt-thumb-of-megawati-20150428-1muhkk.html

"Megawati said to him at the party congress, 'Why haven't the executions been carried out already – you aren't buckling to foreign pressure, are you?'" says Greg Fealy, a leading ANU scholar of Indonesia.

"The politics is that death penalty is extremely popular in Indonesia, Jokowi is slipping in the polls, he's desperate to turn it around, and of the available issues this is the most readily available on which he's looking strong, according to most Indonesians," says Fealy.
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There are obviously many different angles that could be taken to this story. Desire for deterrence (evidence weak that it has any effect), local politics (evidence strong), but there are also discrepancies and backhanders thrown by the Indonesians and the ignoring by the President of his own Constitution which says that reformed prisoners should not be executed.

Those 2 blokes, idiots that they were, were shot after 10 years in gaol, while terrorists who ACTUALLY KILLED innocent people are being released from Indonesian gaols.


http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/ne...are-walking-free/story-fni0cx12-1226904341271


We are certainly entitled to look at these discrepancies and ask what Indonesia's hidden agenda towards other countries might be. Let terrorists off lightly if they happen to be your own citizens, but murder foreigners when you can.


It's a very disturbing time in our relationship with them.
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SirRumpole said:
There are obviously many different angles that could be taken to this story. Desire for deterrence (evidence weak that it has any effect), local politics (evidence strong), but there are also discrepancies and backhanders thrown by the Indonesians and the ignoring by the President of his own Constitution which says that reformed prisoners should not be executed.

Those 2 blokes, idiots that they were, were shot after 10 years in gaol, while terrorists who ACTUALLY KILLED innocent people are being released from Indonesian gaols.


http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/ne...are-walking-free/story-fni0cx12-1226904341271


We are certainly entitled to look at these discrepancies and ask what Indonesia's hidden agenda towards other countries might be. Let terrorists off lightly if they happen to be your own citizens, but murder foreigners when you can.


It's a very disturbing time in our relationship with them.
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Just saw that Australia gave them some 680 million in foreign aids... so this is a good excuse to "review" that and other carrots of foreign policies... will end up giving less. Looks bad if we say we're cutting back because we're a bit poorer now, better if it's for moral outrage and stuff. Once this is all over, we'll think about "giving" a bit more but demand more cooperations and free trade.

Who knows, maybe after this the Indonesian will just tell the AFP to catch their own criminals and let Australia pay the cost of their imprisonment.
 
At least the Filipino maid was spared, at least temporarily. She claimed that she was set up by people back in the Philippines and didn't know she was carrying drugs. The people who who set her up confessed to Philippine authorities just in time to stay the execution.

This is what makes the death penalty so abhorrent. She too could have been executed, though it appears was completely innocent.

Facing execution in Indonesia, Filipina maid gets last-minute reprieve

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/04/29/asia/mary-jane-veloso-stay-of-execution/index.html
 
luutzu said:
Just saw that Australia gave them some 680 million in foreign aids... so this is a good excuse to "review" that and other carrots of foreign policies... will end up giving less. Looks bad if we say we're cutting back because we're a bit poorer now, better if it's for moral outrage and stuff. Once this is all over, we'll think about "giving" a bit more but demand more cooperations and free trade.

Who knows, maybe after this the Indonesian will just tell the AFP to catch their own criminals and let Australia pay the cost of their imprisonment.
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Given the tragedy in Nepal we could justify giving all the aid we give to Indonesia to Nepal where its going to go a lot more good.

Maybe we could also justify not giving any aid to countries that spend a lot on militaries, on the grounds that they should spend their money relieving poverty first.
 
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