P

rosecutors have demanded that the panel of judges at the Batam District Court in Riau Islands sentence two British journalists to five months in jail for allegedly filming a documentary on piracy in the Malacca Strait without proper documents.

Prosecutor Bani Ginting said the defendants, Neil Bonner and Becky Posser, were proven to have violated Article 122 of the 2011 Immigration Law and Article 55 of the Criminal Code (KUHP) on collective crimes.

'€œWe ask the judges to convict defendants Neil Bonner and Becky Posser ['€¦] and sentence them to five months in jail, and order each of them to pay Rp 50 million [US$3,667] in fines or serve an additional one month,'€ Bani told a hearing on Thursday.

Bonner and Posser have been detained since May 28, after they were arrested by the Indonesian Navy patrol in Belakang Padang Island, Batam.

The two foreigners, who entered the country on tourist visas, were arrested along with nine Indonesian nationals as they were allegedly about to film a reenactment of piracy.

The panel of judges, led by presiding judge Wahyu Prasetyo, is scheduled to read the verdict next week.

Should the judges grant the prosecutors'€™ demands, Bani said the defendants would be immediately released and free to return to the UK as by next week they would have already spent five months in detention.

'€œThe amount of time they have spent in detention will count,'€ Bani said.

The Malacca Strait is a maritime area that borders four states: Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand. The strait connects the South China Sea in the north, the Indian Ocean in the south and the Pacific Ocean to the east.

Defense Minister Ryamizard Ryacudu has emphasized the importance of securing the Malacca Strait from piracy.

Last month, head of the Batam Prosecutors'€™ Office'€™s general crimes unit, Ali Akbar, said his office would charge the two defendants under the Immigration Law, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a maximum fine of Rp 500 million, for working in the country while on tourist visas.

Prosecutors, however, sought a much more lenient punishment for the defendants.

Speaking to The Jakarta Post after the hearing, Bani defended such a decision.

'€œThe punishment we'€™ve demanded for the defendants is right for the crime they'€™ve committed,'€ Bani said.

He also rebuffed speculation that the prosecutors had received political pressure to seek a light punishment for the defendants.

'€œThere has been no such intervention. The sentence demand is aimed at creating a deterrent effect for all parties, including foreigners violating our laws,'€ he said.

Separately, the defendants'€™ lawyer, Aristo MA Pangaribuan, argued that the prosecutors were unable to prove the alleged violation during the trial.

'€œThey said the violation was filmmaking, but the prosecutor could not prove so,'€ Aristo said, adding that the local authorities should have deported his clients after they were found to have breached the Immigration Law.

Aristo also said that the sentence demand was heavier than that sought by prosecutors in the trial of two French journalists in Papua last year.

In October 2014, the Jayapura District Court convicted French journalists Thomas Dandois and Valentine Bourrat of abusing entry visas after filming members of the Free Papua Movement (OPM). The court sentenced the journalists to two months and 15 days in jail.