Serge Atlaoui – a Frenchman who spent almost two decades on death row in Indonesia over drug offences before being returned to France – has been granted a conditional release, prosecutors have announced.
Atlaoui, a 61-year-old welder from Metz in the east of France, was flown back to France in February after being on death row in Indonesia since 2007.
The father of four, currently incarcerated near Paris, had his sentence commuted by the French courts to 30 years imprisonment after Indonesia and France reached a bilateral agreement to extradite him on humanitarian grounds.
Atlaoui, who has suffered from cancer, has been approved for conditional release on 18 July, the prosecutor's office in Meaux said in a statement Tuesday, adding that it is subject to follow-up obligations.
Indonesia, France sign deal for transfer of Frenchman on death row
Long battle
"It has been a very long battle, there was no question of me giving up at any moment. This is a very great moment for me today, and it will be for him as soon as he is released," his lawyer Richard Sedillot told France's AFP news agency.
Atlaoui was arrested near Jakarta in 2005 in a secret laboratory capable of producing 100kg of ecstasy per week. Dozens of kilos of drugs were discovered. The authorities accused him of being a "chemist".
He has always denied being a drug trafficker, saying that he was installing machinery in what he thought was an acrylic factory.
Initially sentenced to life in prison, his sentence was reviewed by the Indonesia's supreme court and changed to the death penalty on appeal.
Arrested along with eight Indonesian nationals, he was the only one to receive the death sentence.
He was due to be executed alongside eight others in 2015, but was granted a reprieve after Paris applied pressure and the Indonesian authorities allowed an outstanding appeal to proceed.
Indonesia, which has some of the world's toughest drug laws, has recently released several high-profile detainees, including a Filipina mother on death row and the last five members of the so-called "Bali Nine" drug ring.
(with AFP)
