Indonesia preparing for Lindsay Sandiford’s executions

The Week — Foreigners on death row in Indonesia, including British drug smugglers Lindsay Sandiford and Gareth Cashmore, fear they could be executed “within weeks”, reports The Guardian. The country was widely condemned last year after a group of prisoners, including two Australian men known as the Bali Nine duo, faced the firing squad.

The chatter has grown “ominous” once more, says the Guardian. “Talk that the death squad is at the ready; that a new, bigger execution ground is in the making. Officials say it could be just weeks away.”

A total of 14 prisoners were executed in two separate rounds last year, but a third group was put on hold – “ostensibly for economic reasons, but perhaps, in part, for political ones, too,” says the newspaper.

Security minister Luhut Panjaitan has expressed hopes for less “drama” this time around, although that seems unlikely, after Indonesia was booed at the United Nations last month over its support for executing drug offenders.