AUSTRALIA. DOWNER CONFIDENT OF SAVING BALI NINE

Australia remains confident Indonesia will grant clemency to two members of the Bali Nine sentenced to death, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said. Ringleaders Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran had been condemned to death by firing squad on February 14 for their role in attempting to smuggle heroin from Indonesia to Australia. Downer said Australia would ask for clemency despite the failure of such calls for drug trafficker Nguyen Tuong Van, executed in Singapore in 2005.
"Some countries have granted clemency when we have appealed," he told the Nine Network. "Singapore (did not), but that is the only case where clemency hasn't been granted.
"In the case of Vietnam, for example, clemency has been granted to Australians as a result of appeals.
"We don't know the answer as to whether the president of Indonesia will grant clemency or not and that is a long way down the track."
Justice Minister Chris Ellison defended the Government's decision not to question the death penalty in the case of Bali bomber Amrozi after the same sentence was imposed on Chan and Sukumaran. "Amrozi was an Indonesian citizen," Ellison said. "He wasn't an Australian citizen and we . . . go in to bat when an Australian citizen is subject to the death penalty."