Canberra faces moral maze of Bali verdicts

Si Yi Chen (left), Matthew Norman (centre) and Tach Duc Thanh Nguyen were the last of the nine sentenced. Picture / Reuters

CANBERRA - The completion of the trial of the Bali Nine drug smugglers yesterday is the beginning of a new anguish in Australia.

Matthew Norman, 19, Si Yi Chen, 20, and Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen, 27, will, like four others sentenced this week, die in an Indonesian prison unless they win appeals or gain pardons in two decades' time.

Ringleaders Andrew Chan, 22, and Myuran Sukumaran, 24, will be shot by firing squad if their appeals fail and they cannot convince the Indonesian President to grant clemency.

For Australia, the two death sentences create serious diplomatic sensitivities that pit official repugnance of executions against equally strong repugnance of drug trafficking.

Moral arguments also run counter to many Australians' views that Chan and Sukumaran are thugs who knew the risks in trying to smuggle heroin, and who have shown no remorse.

And Australian opposition to the execution of two of its citizens for drug trafficking - regarded by Indonesia as one of the greatest threats facing their country - runs counter to Canberra's quiet satisfaction at the death penalties imposed on the Bali bombers.

For the moment, the Australian Government will bite its tongue.

Canberra made its position on the death sentence clear when Melbourne drug runner Van Tuong Nguyen was hanged in Singapore in December, and even before sentences were handed down had told Jakarta it would seek clemency for Chan and Sukumaran.

Now it will wait for the appeals process to run its course.

For those jailed for life, an appeal could be a gamble. Judges could increase the penalty to death and they could make better use of a a provision that allows them to seek a 15-year cap on their terms after five years.

Chan and Sukumaran have nothing to lose, and everything to gain, by exhausting the appeals process.

If they fail they can appeal for a presidential pardon, although incumbent Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has vowed not to commute death sentences given to drug traffickers.

If a pardon is refused, Prime Minister John Howard has promised to abide strictly by Australia's long-standing policy of opposing execution and to do everything diplomatically possible to save the pair's lives.

He has the advantage of much warmer relations with Jakarta since the election of Yudhoyono, but said yesterday that personal goodwill would not guarantee success.

"When it comes to the crunch his obligation is to his own people and to the strength of the domestic campaign against drugs. [It is] far greater and more important than his friendship to me - and so it ought to be," he said.

Most observers believe in fact both Governments will need to play a sensitive diplomatic hand to appease popular sentiment at home while avoiding international incidents.

Within Australia, Howard needs to work vigorously enough to satisfy voters who oppose the death penalty without undermining his stance against drugs, or alienating those who believe Chan and Sukumaran brought their fate upon themselves.

The Prime Minister's personal view echoes that of many Australians.

"I don't feel for the traffickers - I'm sorry, I don't. I feel for the parents very, very much. That's awful," he said, adding that he didn't want to "see young lives destroyed" through the drugs that traffickers import.