JAKARTA: Indonesia granted early release on parole yesterday to convicted Australian drug trafficker Schapelle Corby in the resort island of Bali despite calls from some legislators for the high-profile prisoner to serve out her full term.
Corby, was among nearly 1,300 convicts approved for parole, the Justice Ministry said, because she “fulfilled substantive and administrative requirements as laid out by the law.” “This is not the result of ministerial generosity,” Amir Syamsuddin, minister for justice and human rights, told reporters, referring to Corby’s parole. “This is in line with existing law.”
Corby was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2005 for trying to smuggle 4kgs of marijuana into Bali. Drug trafficking usually carries the death penalty in the world’s fourth-largest country.
A small group of MPs this week urged against clemency.
Buddha urn recovered
PHNOM PENH: Cambodian police yesterday said they had recovered a golden urn said to contain relics of Buddha after it was snatched from a mountain shrine, sparking a nationwide manhunt.
The disappearance of the urn -- believed to contain hair, teeth and bones of Buddha -- and several small statues came to light in December and prompted an outcry in the Buddhist-majority country.
Authorities said they found the relics during a raid on Thursday at a house in the southern province of Takeo, about 130 kilometres away from the shrine in the former royal city of Udong.
“Everything is still in the urn,” national police spokesman Kirt Chantharith yesterday.
A suspect was arrested following the raid, according to the website of the Cambodian National Police, which said authorities were still hunting for the “mastermind” of the theft.
Largest WWII bomb destroyed
HONG KONG: Hong Kong police yesterday successfully dismantled the largest World War II bomb yet found in the city after its discovery on a construction site prompted the evacuation of 2,260 people.
The nearly one-tonne US Navy ANM66 bomb was discovered by building workers late Thursday in the Happy Valley district, near the city’s famous downtown racing track.
“It was the biggest bomb ever found in Hong Kong,” a police spokeswoman yesterday.
Bomb disposal experts took 15 hours to remove the live explosives from the bomb, which was unearthed close to a Sikh temple, hotels and residential housing.
“It has taken a longer time because of technical problems when drilling holes into the bomb and because of the large amount of explosives inside it,” senior bomb disposal officer Yuen Hon-wing told reporters.
Agencies
