Dear Foxy,

I doubt that protecting Australian citizens, unless it is protecting them from crime, is in the charter of the AFP. There is no more reason for them to protect an Australian citizen who is a criminal than to protect a citizen of another country who is a criminal.

Australia has a right to expect those within Australia's borders whatever citizenship they may hold to respect Australian law. Indonesia has a right to expect those within Indonesia's borders whatever citizenship they may hold to respect Indonesian law.

I am against capital punishment and do not think Sumarakan and Chan should have been executed. However, it was not the job of the AFP to protect them from that.

The ham-handed approach of Tony Abbott (think of what we've done for Indonesia.) almost assured their execution. When a person or a country does good it should not be to expect a quid pro quo. The campaign to arouse sympathy for them kept referring to them as 'boys'. They were not boys. They were criminals who knew what they were doing. I believe that even criminals who know what they were doing should not be executed. It is state-sanctioned murder. However, an honest appraisal of Sumarakan and Chan would have been less emotive but possibly more effective. The reason there should be no execution was not because they were innocent teenagers but because, however flawed they may be, they were still human beings.

Hi there FOXY & STEELEREDUX...

Of course I'm only speculating as to why the AFP chose to act or omit to act if you like, in the way they did ? I believe they are signatories to this 'Intelligence exchange' model that exists between various law enforcement agencies world wide ? I do know positively, that the AFP is the Interpol representative here in Australia.

I can't accurately recall, but didn't Mr Mick KELTY, the former AFP Commissioner travel to Bali to plea for leniency for Scott RUSH, when he too was originally sentenced to death ? Suggesting to the Indonesian Court of Appeal, that RUSH's age, his obvious naivety, and his insignificant place within the original pecking order of the 'Nine', I can't really say ? Whether Mr KELTY had a touch of conscience over the specific knowledge he possessed of the lad, supplied to him by Mr RUSH Snr., I couldn't say ?

Again I must stress that I have this total opposition to Capital Punishment, not for any particular moral or Religious argument, rather for a more heuristic or empirical reason ? As a modern, more scientifically advanced nation, the need to punish an individual by simply putting them to death is an admission that as a society we've failed in our endeavours to deal with our communities most serious misfit's and those few who're seemingly beyond any form of rehabilitation ?

I must admit, that I was the only detective, firstly in any squad in which I served, and latter I/C of my own squad, that did NOT support Capital Punishment ? Naturally, I withdrew tactically, from any discussion approaching the subject of the death penalty ?

I can only imagine the derision and ridicule I copped, in and around the various locker rooms, both at the old CIB and at the various LAC Stations that I served ! Seemingly for being 'out of step' with the other 'hard headed' jacks ! And did I care, couldn't give a 'sh.t' ! We could always retire to the car park after our shift.

Dear David F.,

Thank you for your opinions.

I do understand that these two men had committed a crime
(on foreign soil).
However the problem that I have understanding is
why would our federal police feel a moral responsibility
to report the crime to foreign authorities - knowing
that the men would face the death penality?

This is what I am having a problem understanding.

Dear O Sung Wu,

I am pleased to read that you stuck to your principles
despite what your fellow officers may have thought.

Judging from many of the comments in this discussion
it appears that some feel strongly that the punishment the men
received - death by firing squad fits the crime they
committed. No sympathy.

It does not seem to matter
that no one actually died from using their heroin as it
never was sold or consumed - the men were killed on
principle.

It also does not matter that the men committed
their crime over ten years ago - and have since proved
to be rehabilitated. Please for clemency had no effect.
And the drug trafficking trade will continue in Indonesia -
as it has done to date.
As will the corruption and graft. Drug barons will not
be charged, neither will
members of the police force, military, and judiciary -
all of whom will continue to sleep late at night
on very expensive mattresses. And we will continue to send
them $600 million in aid.

That's the way the game is played apparently.

Dear Foxy,

I think capital punishment is state-sanctioned murder. I think no one is executed justly. However, I do not agree with your arguments.

You wrote: "It does not seem to matter that no one actually died from using their heroin as it never was sold or consumed - the men were killed on principle."

If a person stealthily approaches a house and is apprehended before entry and that person is found to be carrying burglary tools that person has committed an offense and can be found guilty.

You also wrote: "It also does not matter that the men committed their crime over ten years ago - and have since proved to be rehabilitated."

They have not been executed earlier partly because they have employed legal procedures available to them under Indonesian law. They have not been proven to be rehabilitated. Rehabilitation of a criminal is shown when the prisoner has been freed and and does not commit crimes. The two men behaved well in prison. That is not rehabilitation.

You also wrote: "And the drug trafficking trade will continue in Indonesia - as it has done to date. As will the corruption and graft. Drug barons will not be charged, neither will members of the police force, military, and judiciary - all of whom will continue to sleep late at night on very expensive mattresses. And we will continue to send them $600 million in aid."

The above is quite true. I believe that Blair, Bush and Howard should be indicted as war criminals for lying us into the Gulf Wars. However, that does not mean the Nazis at Nuremberg were unfairly convicted.

How much of the aid money to Indonesia actually goes to help the Indonesian people is moot. Australia has trained the Indonesian Kopassus division which has committed atrocities. Indonesia should get out of Irian Jaya. There are many injustices, and the injustices will continue. That fact we cannot remedy all injustices does not mean Chan and Sumarakan were unfairly convicted.

As I wrote previously I generally agree with you but not this time.

I totally oppose the death penalty in all situations. I do not oppose punishment for crime as such, its required, and its necessary. I think rehabilitation is more important than retribution, even for murderers and drug dealers etc. Their crimes are abhorrent, no one can deny that, and they have to be punished, but state sanctioned murder and that is what execution is, its not the answer.

Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran were not at the top of the pile in drug dealing, nowhere near it. These blokes organised the drug shipment for unnamed Mr Big's of the drug world, who are free and very much alive today. In a 10 year period Chan and Sukumaran showed, for whatever reason, they had reformed to some degree over that long period. From a purely pragmatic point of view, they could have been most useful in the reform of other prisoners, but not now.

Paul,

You're using emotive language, murder is by definition the unlawful taking of a human life, when a life is taken by a State under its laws then such an action is not unlawful.

Bye the way, is the taking of a human life justified when it is done in self defence?