A Peruvian woman has been arrested after allegedly trying to smuggle cocaine and ecstasy into Bali hidden inside a sex toy and her underwear.
The 42-year-old woman, identified by authorities only by the initials NS, arrived at the international airport in Bali from Qatar on 12 August, where she was stopped by customs officials.
"The customs officers suspected her behaviour, and after consulting with the police, they did a further check on her," Bali police narcotics unit director Radiant, identified by only his first name, said at a press conference.
Upon searching the woman, officers say they found 1.4kg of cocaine and 43 ecstasy pills – worth a combined $70,000 (£52,000) – hidden about her person, including inside a sex toy and in her underwear.
"The narcotics were hidden in six plastic packages wrapped in black duct tape inside a green bra, three similar packages in black underwear, and a sex toy containing drugs, which was inserted into her body," Mr Radiant said, according to BBC News.
The Peruvian national told law enforcement said she was hired by a man who she met on dark web in April, and told to transport the drugs into Indonesia. She was promised $20,000 in return, said the officer. The woman took a flight from Barcelona to Indonesia, with a layover at Doha, before arriving in Bali on 12 August.
She has been charged under Indonesia’s stringent narcotics laws and could face a maximum punishment of the death penalty. The southeast Asian nation has some of the world’s harshest laws around drug smuggling.
About 530 people, including 96 foreigners, are on death row in Indonesia, mostly for drug-related crimes, the latest figures from the Ministry of Immigration and Corrections show.
The country’s last executions, of an Indonesian and three foreigners, were carried out in July 2016.
In 2015, two members of the so-called “Bali nine” group of convicted drug smugglers from Australia were executed by firing squad, after the group were arrested in 2005 attempting to smuggle heroin out of Indonesia.
Earlier this year British man Thomas Parker was sentenced to 10 months in prison in Bali for drug offences, after being arrested for collecting a package that contained 1kg of MDMA.
And last month, three British nationals narrowly avoided the death penalty after they were found guilty of smuggling cocaine disguised as packets of Angel Delight into Indonesia.
