Bali Nine 'do not need Australian police help'

JAKARTA - Indonesian authorities say they won't need Australian police officers to testify in court to get the Bali Nine before a firing squad.

Attorney-General Philip Ruddock today withdrew cooperation in the case, saying it was standing Australian policy not to assist in foreign death penalty cases.

Indonesian police arrested the nine in Bali in April after a tip-off from the Australian Federal Police (AFP).

Bali drug squad chief Colonel Bambang Sugiarto said testimony from AFP officers would not be required in court.

"No problem ... their statements are not important according to the law," he said.

Indonesian prosecutors yesterday handed over case files to the Denpasar District Court, clearing the way for seven trials to begin next month.

The files contain evidence gathered by AFP agents against the eight men and one woman who all face drug charges that carry the death penalty.

But Mr Ruddock said: "we will not provide cooperation in relation to criminal matters unless there is an assurance that a death penalty will not be sought".

"If there was further information that had to be obtained from here through the Australian Federal Police, we would seek an assurance that Indonesia would not be wanting a death penalty in each of those cases," he told reporters in Hobart.

In Perth, Justice Minister Chris Ellison later confirmed that any request for assistance from Indonesia would have to be made under the two countries' Mutual Assistance Treaty, and require the death penalty to be taken off the table.

"Wherever an Australian faces the death penalty, we pull out all stops to make a plea on their behalf for that not to be carried out," Senator Ellison said.

Sugiarto's assessment was backed by the prosecutor Ni Putu Indriati who will act in defendant Renae Lawrence's case.

"In the document there are no AFP as witnesses, only a letter from the AFP explaining there were Australians who wanted to export narcotics," she said.

She said the withholding of Australian assistance won't affect the case.

Four of the nine Australians, detained at Bali's Ngurah Rai Airport allegedly with blocks of heroin weighing between 1.3kg and 2.9kg strapped to their bodies, will be tried separately.

The four are Wollongong man Martin Stephens, 29, Brisbane duo Michael Czugaj and Scott Rush, both 19, and 27-year-old Lawrence of Wallsend near Newcastle.

The so-called gang enforcer Andrew Chan, 21, of Sydney, will also be tried individually, as will the accused mastermind of the gang, Myuran Sukumaran, 24, also from Sydney.

Three others -- Brisbane man Tach Duc Thanh Nguyen, 27, and Sydney pair Si Yi Chen, 20, and Matthew James Norman, 18, -- who were arrested with Sukumaran at the Melasti Hotel in Kuta will be tried together.

The hotel raid, launched with AFP observers alongside Indonesian police, allegedly netted 300g of heroin divided between two small bags.

- AAP