Australian PM asks Indonesian president to "show respect," keep terrorist in prison

0 Comment(s)Print E-mail Xinhua, January 22, 2019
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CANBERRA, Jan. 22 (Xinhua) -- Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has called on Indonesian President Joko Widodo to overturn the decision to pardon convicted terrorist Abu Bakar Bashir.

Widodo announced over the weekend that Bashir, 81, would be released from prison on humanitarian grounds.

Bashir was nine years into a 15-year sentence for his role in the 2002 Bali bombings, which killed 202 people including 88 Australians.

Bashir was convicted of funding a paramilitary training camp for Jemaah Islamiah terrorists who set off two bombs outside nightclubs on the Indonesian island of Bali, a popular destination for Australian tourists, in 2002.

Addressing the decision to release Bashir, Morrison on Tuesday asked Widodo to "show great respect to Australia" by making Bashir serve his full sentence.

"We have been consistent ­always - governments of both persuasions over a long period of time - about our concerns about Abu Bakar Bashir and that he should serve what the Indonesian justice system has delivered to him as his sentence," he told News Corp Australia on Tuesday.

"We have been very clear about the need to ensure that as part of our joint counter-terrorism efforts - we have an excellent counter terrorism partnership with Indonesia - that Abu Bakar Bashir would not be in any position or in any way able to influence or ­incite anything," said Morrison.

Bashir pledged allegiance to Islamic State in 2014. Enditem

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