France asks Indonesia to transfer death row prisoner Serge Atlaoui

NEWS WIRES

27 December 2024 at 9:55 pm·1-min read

French drug convict and death row prisoner Serge Atlaoui arrives at Tangerang court outside Jakarta on April 1, 2015.

France has requested that Indonesia transfer Serge Atlaoui, a 61-year-old French national on death row who has spent nearly 20 years behind bars in the Southeast Asian country on drug charges.

France has sent Indonesia an official request for the transfer of a French death row inmate who has spent nearly 20 years in prison, an Indonesian minister told AFP on Saturday.

Indonesia has in recent weeks released half a dozen high-profile detainees, including a Filipina mum on death row and the last five members of the so-called "Bali Nine" drug ring.

French diplomats have acknowledged that talks were underway for the transfer of Serge Atlaoui, a 61-year-old Frenchman arrested in 2005 at a drugs factory outside the capital Jakarta.

The Indonesian government has now confirmed it received the official transfer request, which will be discussed in early January.

"We have received a formal letter requesting the transfer of Serge Atlaoui," senior law and human rights minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra told AFP.

The French embassy in Jakarta declined AFP's request for comment.

Atlaoui's lawyer, Richard Sedillot, said that France's intervention brought "immense hope".

He was initially sentenced to life in prison, but the Supreme Court in 2007 increased the sentence to death on appeal.

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