Indonesia has agreed to repatriate two elderly Dutch nationals who have served more than a decade each in Indonesian prisons for drug trafficking offences. The agreement was signed on Tuesday by officials from both countries, with the men expected to be flown to Amsterdam on 8 December.
Siegfried Mets, 74, was sentenced to death in 2008 for smuggling 600,000 ecstasy pills from the Netherlands to Indonesia. He has spent 17 years in a Jakarta prison. Ali Tokman, 65, received a life sentence in 2015 after being caught at an airport with 6kg of MDMA. He has served 11 years.
Indonesia’s senior law minister, Yusril Ihza Mahendra, confirmed that both men are in poor health, prompting the Dutch government to request their repatriation on humanitarian grounds. President Prabowo Subianto approved the request.
Under a bilateral prisoner transfer treaty, the men will continue serving their sentences in Dutch prisons upon arrival. Mets’s death sentence will be commuted to life imprisonment, as the Netherlands abolished capital punishment in 1870 and does not recognise foreign executions.
Dutch Ambassador to Indonesia, Marc Gerritsen, expressed gratitude, stating the transfer illustrates strong bilateral cooperation in justice and law. Indonesia has around 530 prisoners on death row, including nearly 100 foreigners. President Prabowo’s administration has repatriated several foreign prisoners through similar agreements.
