听月水榭

THE death sentences of three of the Bali nine have been reduced to life imprisonment by Indonesia's Supreme Court, giving hope to the three remaining Australians on death row.

The results of final appeals by Matthew Norman, Si Yi Chen and Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen have not been formally announced, but court sources confirmed last night that judges had decided to spare their lives.

A spokesman for their legal team, Henri Sitanggang, also confirmed the news. He said he was delighted their lives had been spared, and that they would now move to seek a pardon from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

In their final appeal, all three confessed to their roles in the plan to import heroin from Bali to Australia, but begged for forgiveness and a chance to reform. The court took into account their youth and the fact they were "not masterminds".

The court decision is a diplomatic fillip for Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who indicated to President Yudhoyono during talks in December that Canberra would lobby hard for the Australians on death row to be spared.

The so-called "Melasti Three" were arrested on April 17, 2005 in a room at Bali's Melasti Hotel, where police found 350 grams of heroin in a suitcase.

Their arrests came on the same day that other members of the Bali nine were apprehended at Denpasar Airport with drugs strapped to their bodies.

Norman, Chen and Nguyen were originally sentenced to life in prison and a subsequent hearing reduced that to 20 years. But prosecutors appealed and their sentences were later upgraded to the death penalty.

Last night Mr Sitanggang said the trio should have been given shorter jail sentences as they were young and wanted to redeem themselves. "Of course I am happy because we have saved these peoples lives," Mr Sitanggang said.

"Our next program is to apply for the grace of the President."

He said that, in time, lawyers would seek remissions for the trio and he hoped they could be released within 10 years.

The appeal on behalf of Norman, Chen and Nguyen was based in part on the fact that prosecutors had never requested the death penalty for them.

The court's decision could prompt another of the heroin couriers, Scott Rush, and the alleged ringleaders of the importation plot, Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan, to lodge their final appeals to the Supreme Court to avoid the death penalty.

Instead of appealing first to the Supreme Court, Rush, Sukumaran and Chan made an unsuccessful Constitutional Court challenge, attempting to overturn Indonesia's death penalty.