Dutch man leaves Indonesia death row to return home
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Dutch life-sentenced prisoner Ali Tokman (left) and death row convict Siegfried Mets attend a handover ceremony for their repatriation at Cipinang Prison in Jakarta on Dec 8.
PHOTO: EPA
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JAKARTA – A 74-year-old Dutchman sentenced to death in Indonesia 17 years ago for drug trafficking
An AFP photographer earlier saw Siegfried Mets walking out of Cipinang prison in Jakarta.
Indonesian law and human rights official Ahmad Usmarwi Kaffah confirmed his release.
Mets flew home late on Dec 8, accompanied by fellow Dutch inmate Ali Tokman, 65, who was serving a life sentence for a similar offence and also was granted a reprieve.
A source from Indonesia’s law and human rights ministry said both had left Soekarno–Hatta International Airport on a KLM flight that was scheduled to land in Amsterdam on Dec 9.
The repatriation of the two convicted drug smugglers on humanitarian grounds follows a deal struck this week between Indonesia and the Dutch government.
“Their detention will be transferred to the Netherlands,” Indonesian official I Nyoman Gede Surya Mataram told a press conference earlier on Dec 8.
Mets and Tokman have been held in Indonesian jails for years after falling foul of the country’s strict narcotics laws.
Mets was sentenced to death in 2008 for smuggling 600,000 ecstasy pills into Indonesia, but his execution had not been carried out.
Tokman was handed a death sentence in 2015 for smuggling more than 6kg of the stimulant MDMA. The sentence was later commuted to life.
Dutch deputy ambassador Adriaan Palm told journalists that the authorities in The Hague would deliberate on whether the men’s sentences will be continued in the Netherlands.
“Here they fall under the Indonesian law, in the Netherlands they will fall under the Dutch law,” he said.
“After they come back to the Netherlands, then we’ll see what happens next,” he added.
Mets has been suffering from a broken hand, and Tokman from high blood pressure, Jakarta’s human rights minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra has said.
Indonesia has some of the world’s toughest drug laws, but has moved to free several high-profile foreign detainees since 2024.
Ministers have generally cited humanitarian reasons for their release, but have also indicated that the transfers could eventually help Jakarta bring back Indonesians detained abroad.
More than 90 foreign nationals were on death row in Indonesia, all for drug convictions, as at early November, according to the Immigration and Corrections Ministry.
In November, Indonesia deported Lindsay Sandiford
