Australians to be moved to Indonesia execution site
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DENPASAR, Indonesia (AFP) - Two Australian drug smugglers on death row in Indonesia will be transferred Wednesday from their jail on Bali to an island off Java where they will be put to death, an official said.
Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, the ringleaders of the so-called "Bali Nine" drug trafficking gang, will be flown on a military aircraft, with a second plane escorting them, said Momock Bambang Samiarso, head of the Bali prosecutor's office.
Officials are yet to announce a date for their executions, but the transfer indicates it is imminent. Their lawyers said that pushing ahead with the transfer and executions would amount to a "miscarriage of justice" as legal challenges are still ongoing.
The men, in their early 30s, were convicted of trying to smuggle heroin out of Indonesia in 2005 and sentenced to death the following year.
They recently lost their appeals for presidential clemency, typically a death row convict's last chance to avoid the firing squad, and their looming executions have strained ties with Australia, a neighbour and key ally.
They are among a group of 10 drug convicts expected to face a firing squad in the upcoming batch of executions. Officials have not confirmed the nationalities of the others, although convicts from France, Brazil and the Philippines are among those who recently lost their appeals for presidential clemency.
Australia, Brazil and France have been piling diplomatic pressure on Jakarta, but President Joko Widodo has been a vocal supporter of the death penalty for drug traffickers, saying Indonesia is facing an "emergency" due to rising narcotics use.
