Frenchman Serge Atlaoui and his Indonesian lawyer Nancy Yuliana, during a hearing before the Tangerang court, near Jakarta, April 1, 2015 (AFP / ROMEO GACAD)
At 61, Frenchman Serge Atlaoui, sentenced to death in Indonesia in 2007, has lived on death row since then but has “never lost hope”, according to relatives and wants to believe today after 19 years in prison, with possible repatriation.
France in fact transmitted an official transfer request on December 19, Yusril Ihza Mahendra, Indonesian Minister in charge of Legal Affairs and Human Rights, told AFP on Saturday.
In 2005, then aged 42, the artisan welder from Metz (east) arrived near Jakarta to install industrial machines in what he thought was an acrylic factory.
On November 11, 2005, “the day of my arrest, I was supposed to leave, but the driver had already left. Bad luck! I cleaned my tools, and they arrived,” he told AFP in February 2015, evoking the police operation.
Arrested on the site of what was in fact an esctasy production laboratory, the man who has always refuted any involvement in drug trafficking is initially sentenced to life in prison. The Supreme Court increased the sanction in 2007, imposing the death penalty on the Frenchman as well as eight other members of the “network” of traffickers.
After years spent in a high-security prison on the island of Nusakambangan, nicknamed the “Indonesian Alcatraz”, in southeast Java, he is now detained in Salemba prison in Jakarta.
Prison which has the merit of being close to a hospital, because the Frenchman “is ill”, Mr. Yusril revealed on December 3 on the sidelines of a press conference.
“Hope is the difference between life and death”, underlined again in 2015 Mr. Atlaoui, who according to Raphaël Chenuil-Hazan, general director of the association Ensemble contre la penalty de mort (ECPM) which has maintained since 2007, “has never lost hope, he has unfailing morale because he thinks first of his family and others”.
“Model prisoner”, it was he who restored the water network in his prison and also repaired the framework, adds for AFP Mr. Chenuil-Hazan, who visited him for the last time in November 2023.
Father of four children and married to Sabine, Mr. Atlaoui “is quite exceptional, he has always demonstrated a resilience which commands respect”, adds his French lawyer Richard Sedillot.
– “Crossed Destiny” –
France requested a series of documents from Jakarta in early November with a view to formulating an official transfer request, according to a source close to the matter. Jakarta had opened the way to possible repatriations of prisoners, indicating at the same time that it was also in discussions with the Philippines and Australia.
The negotiations were quickly successful for the Filipino Mary Jane Veloso, also sentenced to death, and repatriated to Manila on December 18. The last five Australian members of the Bali 9, in prison for 19 years for drug trafficking, returned to their country three days earlier.
“Serge is of course aware that Mary Jane (Veloso) has been transferred to the Philippines. He is extremely relieved,” added Mr. Chenuil-Hazan for whom “there is a sort of crossed destiny between Serge and Mary Jane “, a 39-year-old mother, sentenced to death in 2010 for drug trafficking.
Mr Atlaoui and Ms Veloso were both on a list of 10 detainees who were to face the firing squad on the same day in April 2015. Among them were the two Australian “masterminds” of the “Bali 9” gang, who had attempted to smuggle heroin from Bali to Australia.
Eight were executed but the names of Serge Atlaoui and Mary Jean Veloso were removed from the list at the last moment. The Frenchman had obtained a temporary reprieve after Paris increased pressure, with Indonesian authorities agreeing to let a pending appeal take its course.
An Australian media outlet indicated in 2015 that former general Prabowo Subianto, then in opposition, had asked then-President Joko Widodo, nicknamed “Jokowi”, to halt the executions of foreigners, including that of Mr. Atlaoui: putting possible political support in the balance, Mr. Prabowo urged Jokowi “not to execute nationals of a friendly country”.
This intervention by the man who subsequently became Jokowi's minister and then in 2024 his successor as Indonesian president, was confirmed to AFP by a source close to the matter, wishing to remain anonymous.
Questioned by AFP, a spokesperson for the presidency indicated, however, that he “could not confirm” this information.
