Four people arrested for drug offences in Bali face the death penalty

At least four people face the death penalty for allegedly smuggling drugs to the holiday island of Bali, thereby violating Indonesia's notoriously strict anti-drug laws.

Bali police have arrested six people, including foreigners, on drug charges in the popular tourist destination since July, local authorities said.

Two Thai nationals, Rachanon Jongseeha, 33, and Woranawan Wongsuwan, 31, were arrested on September 8 upon arrival at Bali's Ngurah Rai airport for possession of methamphetamine and crystal MDMA, provincial anti-drug chief Rudy Ahmad Sudrajat said.

The two were found to be carrying 1.9 kilograms of methamphetamine mixed with the party drug MDMA in 108 bags of a fruit-flavored collagen drink and 20 MDMA pills, police said.

“The medicines would be handed over to two Indonesians who had ordered them,” Sudrajat said.

Police later arrested the two Indonesians for allegedly ordering the drugs from Thailand. One of the suspects was arrested at Bali airport, a courier later. All four could be shot if they are charged and found guilty, Sudrajat said.

Police also announced that two European men were arrested in July on drug charges and face harsh punishment, but not the death penalty.

A Latvian man with the initials VS was arrested at Bali airport on July 4 for carrying 450.41 grams of hashish and 977.83 grams of cannabis in a suitcase. Police said the suspect had a tattoo indicating his affiliation with organized crime gangs in the former Soviet Union.

He faces a life sentence for cannabis smuggling.

A Swede with the initials SUE was arrested on July 31 after a raid on a villa in the popular tourist resort of Gianyar. Officers seized 201.28 grams of hashish after receiving a tip-off that the person had received a suspicious package in the mail from Thailand.

The Swedish citizen faces 15 years in prison, Sudrajat said.

Indonesia has some of the strictest drug laws in the world and over 150 people are on death row, most of them for drug trafficking. About a third of them are foreigners.

Under current President Joko Widodo, who took office in 2014, 18 people convicted of drug offenses have been executed.

The anti-drug unit raided a suspected drug laboratory in May, resulting in the arrest of two Ukrainians, a Russian and an Indonesian. All of the foreigners arrested face the death penalty for operating a laboratory for the hydroponic production of marijuana and mephedrone.

An Australian man was sentenced to six months' medical rehabilitation in July for possession of methamphetamine. Troy Andrew Smith, from Port Lincoln in South Australia, was arrested on April 30 after police raided his Legian hotel and seized 3.15 grams of crystal meth in a toothpaste container in his room. Police found another 0.4 grams of the drug in his desk drawer, as well as a bong and a lighter.

In early November 2019, a court in Bali sentenced two Thai citizens to 16 years in prison for smuggling 1 kg of methamphetamine into the country. That same year, a French citizen was sentenced to death on Lombok, an island next to Bali, for smuggling 3 kg of MDMA before a higher court commuted his sentence to 19 years in prison.

Indonesia carried out its last executions in July 2016, when three Nigerians convicted of drug offenses and one Indonesian were shot dead on the prison island of Nusa Kambangan.