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MANILA, Philippines -- A Filipino woman who spent years on death row in Indonesia for drug trafficking, and who was nearly executed by firing squad in 2015, said Wednesday she's happy to be back in the Philippines but is asking its president to set her free.
Mary Jane Veloso spent almost 15 years in prison but won a last-minute reprieve that allows her to serve the rest of her sentence in the Philippines and will lead to her testimony exposing how a criminal syndicate duped her into being an unwitting accomplice and drug courier.
“What’s important is I be given clemency so that I can be with my family,” she told reporters at a prison facility where she was brought to after arriving in Manila, and where she had a tearful reunion with her family.
“I have been imprisoned for fifteen years in Indonesia for a crime that I did not do.” she added, fighting back tears as her arm was draped on her mother’s shoulder and her two sons stood close by.
Her transfer removes the possibility of execution. The Philippines, Asia’s largest Roman Catholic nation, has long abolished the death penalty.
Veloso was moved late Sunday from a female prison in Yogyakarta to Indonesia’s capital of Jakarta, then escorted Tuesday night to a flight to Manila. Her repatriation was made possible by a “practical arrangement” for the transfer of prisoners signed between the two countries on Dec. 6.
Relatives and a small group of supporters, including Veloso’s two sons who were 1- and 6-years old when she was arrested in 2010, welcomed her with cheers and tears upon her arrival at Manila’s airport.
“Welcome home Mary Jane,” read a huge banner carried by relatives and supporters who were clasping flowers.
Cries rang out and the crowd waved as Veloso was escorted by a security cordon out of Manila’s airport into a waiting van. Her parents wiped away tears.
“We take this opportunity to extend our gratitude to the Indonesian government and to all who have extended assistance for the welfare of Ms. Mary Jane Veloso,” President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said in statement Wednesday.
The government will ensure Veloso’s safety and welfare as she continues to serve her sentence in the country, the statement added. Marcos did not mention clemency, and presidential palace officials earlier said there has been no decision about the family’s appeal.
Foreign Affairs Secretary Enrique Manalo also said Wednesday that Velasco’s transfer “is a significant achievement for the bilateral relations between the Philippines and Indonesia, a mark of the trust and friendship between our two nations.”
Veloso told a group of reporters outside the Pondok Bambu female prison in eastern Jakarta that she was overwhelmed by a variety of emotions, before getting into the car that took her to the airport.
“Thank you, Indonesia, I love Indonesia,” Veloso said.
She said that she brought many souvenirs given to her Indonesian fellow inmates and friends, including a guitar, books, knittings and rosaries.
Veloso, who will turn 40 next month, was arrested in 2010 at an airport in the Indonesian city of Yogyakarta, where officials discovered about 2.6 kilograms (5.7 pounds) of heroin hidden in her luggage. The single mother of two sons was convicted and sentenced to death.
Her case caused a public outcry in the Philippines. She traveled to Indonesia in 2010, where her recruiter, Maria Kristina Sergio, reportedly told her a job as a domestic worker awaited her. Sergio also allegedly provided the suitcase where the drugs were found.
In 2015, Indonesia moved Veloso to an island prison where she and eight other drug convicts from Australia, Brazil, France, Ghana and Nigeria were scheduled to be executed by firing squad despite objections from their home countries.
Indonesia executed the eight but Veloso was granted a stay of execution because Sergio was arrested in the Philippines, just two days earlier.
The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime says Indonesia is a major drug smuggling hub despite having some of the strictest drug laws in the world, in part because international drug syndicates target its young population.
Indonesia’s last executions, of a citizen and three foreigners, were carried out in July 2016.
About 530 people are on death row in Indonesia, mostly for drug-related crimes, including 96 foreigners, the Ministry of Immigration and Corrections reported last month.
Five Australians who spent almost 20 years in Indonesian prisons for heroin trafficking returned to Australia on Sunday under a deal struck between the governments.
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Cerojano reported from Manila, the Philippines. Associated Press journalists Andi Jatmiko and Achmad Ibrahim in Jakarta, Indonesia, and contributed to this report.
