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Indonesia agrees to return death row convict Mary Jane Veloso to Philippines
Indonesia has agreed to send Mary Jane Veloso back to the Philippines after years of attempts by her home country and international human rights groups to save the drug convict from death row.
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Women's rights activists hold a candlelit vigil in Manila on Sept. 13, 2016, calling to save Filipina drug convict Mary Jane Veloso who was facing execution in Indonesia. (AFP/Noel Celis)
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ndonesia has agreed to send Mary Jane Veloso back to the Philippines to serve the rest of her sentence there, after years of attempts by her home country and international human rights groups to save the drug convict from death row.
Philippine President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. announced the news on Instagram on Wednesday, saying that Veloso “is coming home” and that the nation is looking forward to welcoming her.
“After over a decade of diplomacy and consultations with the Indonesian government, we managed to delay her execution long enough to reach an agreement to finally bring her back to the Philippines,” Marcos said.
Veloso, a Filipina domestic worker, has been on death row for 14 years in Indonesia.
She was arrested in 2010 after 2.6 kilograms of heroin was found in her suitcase at Adisutjipto International Airport in Yogyakarta upon arrival from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. She was sentenced to death in the same year.
She maintained her innocence throughout her trial, insisting that while she was waiting for a job in Malaysia, a female Philippine employment recruiter gave her the suitcase and asked her to fly to Yogyakarta to hand over the suitcase to a man.
Veloso was moments away from facing the firing squad in 2015 when she was granted a temporary reprieve after the woman suspected of recruiting her was arrested in the Philippines.
