Nigerian set to be executed in Indonesia

Indonesia plans to execute this year at least two foreign convicts, one from Nigeria and another from Zimbabwe, the attorney general said on Wednesday.

President Joko Widodo has pledged to increase the number of executions this year and next as part of his crackdown on drugs.

Asked if there were any foreigners on the list of convicts to be executed, Attorney General H.M. Prasetyo told reporters: “We have foreigners, among them from Nigeria and Zimbabwe.”

He did not elaborate on the crimes of which they were convicted.

Prasetyo added that no convicts from the United States, Europe or Australia were on the list to be executed this year.

A 59-year-old British women, Lindsay Sandiford, was sentenced to death after being convicted in 2013 of trying to smuggle cocaine worth $2.5 million into the country.

A Philippine maid, Mary Jane Veloso, got a last-minute reprieve last year in response to a request from Manila after an employment recruiter, whom Veloso had accused of planting drugs in her luggage, gave herself up to police in the Philippines.

Last year Indonesia executed 14 people, mostly foreign drug traffickers. Prasetyo previously said at least 16 prisoners would be executed this year and more than double that number next year.