Veloso kin to fly to Indonesia to seek last-minute reprieve

The mother and two children of death-row convict Mary Jane Veloso are scheduled to fly to Indonesia on Thursday night, the Department of Foreign Affairs said.

Speaking in a news briefing on Thursday, foreign affairs spokesperson and Assistant Secretary Charles Jose said Veloso’s mother Celia and her two children Mark Darren and Mark Daniel will leave Manila for Indonesia via Philippine Airlines flight PR0535.

They will arrive in Jakarta, Indonesia, at 11:55 p.m. on Thursday. Upon reaching the airport, they will be met by her father Cesar and sister Marites who both went ahead to Indonesia, accompanied by lawyers in a last-ditch effort to save her from an impending execution by firing squad.

READ: Veloso sons, ma and siblings to fly to Indonesia Thursday | Veloso’s sister flies to Jakarta

The following day, the family will travel to the Yogyakarta prison facility where Veloso is jailed.

“The whole family will be able to visit her from April 24 to April 30. They are scheduled to meet with the embassy-hired lawyers,” Jose said.

Jose said the DFA is also arranging the trip of the other relatives of Veloso.

As of press time, Veloso’s lawyers have yet to file a second appeal for a judicial review of her case. “We will file it as soon as we are able to complete all the necessary documents … hopefully before April 24,” Jose said.

One of the human rights lawyers helping Veloso, Edre Olalia, secretary general of the National Union of the Peoples’ Lawyers who was also in Yogyakarta, said the Indonesian private lawyers of Veloso would raise the argument that Veloso was a victim of drug trafficking as a new ground for a second judicial review.

“In accordance with international and parallel local laws, she must not be penalized for any alleged crime which was integral and in connection with such human trafficking scheme, and must instead be repatriated back to the Philippines,” Olalia said.

Veloso, a 30-year-old mother of two, was sentenced to death in Indonesia in 2010 after she was caught smuggling heroin from Kuala Lumpur to Yogyakarta. Claiming to be innocent, she said she was duped by her recruiter Kristina Sergio who had promised her a job.

The suspension of the executions will expire on April 24 just after the conclusion of the meeting of Asian and African nations in Jakarta and Bandung, otherwise called the Bandung Conference.

The executions of Veloso and the other convicted drug smugglers the world knows as Bali Nine will not be held until such time according to Indonesian officials. RC