A British grandmother is set to return to the UK and be freed from one of Indonesia’s most notorious prisons after she was sentenced to death for drug trafficking.
It will end a 12-year ordeal for Lindsay Sandiford’s family, who have fought for the 69-year-old’s release.
The grandmother could be free to return home from Bali imminently after an Indonesian Government source told AFP an agreement had been reached with the UK Government.
“The practical arrangement will be signed today (Tuesday),” the source said.
“The transfer will be done immediately after the technical side of the transfer is agreed.”
British national Shahab Shahabadi, 35, was arrested in 2014 and imprisoned on drug charges.
She is also due to be released.
Teesside woman, Ms Sandiford, was arrested in Bali airport in 2012 after customs officers found a cocaine haul worth an estimated £1.6million in a hidden compartment of her suitcase.
Lindsay Sandiford has been in jail for 12 years on death row
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She was arriving back from Thailand and sentenced to death the next year.
Ms Sandiford claimed a British gang had forced her to smuggle drugs from Thailand to Bali.
She added that they threatened to kill one of her two sons if she refused.
Indonesia has some of the toughest drug laws in the world, and multiple foreign nationals have faced death row over the years.
Lindsay Sandiford says she was forced into the drug smuggle
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A Coordinating Ministry for Legal, Human Rights, Immigration and Correction statement confirmed a press conference was scheduled to announce the “release of two British nationals”.
Ms Sandiford has been held in Kerobokan Prison.
It is regarded as one of the country’s worst jails and holds 1,000 more inmates than the 357 it was built to house in 1979.
A 2017 report by the ABC found almost 80 per cent of its prisoners were on drug charges.
The jail has seen a number of riots in the past decade, and some have even been deadly.
The New York Times wrote that staff had been bribed by wealthier inmates to give them drugs and even let them go on outside trips.
Breakouts from the prison have occurred despite its high security.
Four foreign inmates escaped in 2017 after digging a 50ft tunnel under the prison walls from an open courtyard.
Prisoners set fire to their mattresses in 1999 and overwhelmed guards trying to contain the flames.
Almost 300 prisoners had escaped.
At the time Ms Sandiford was arrested, there were about 90 people awaiting execution in the prison.
Ms Sandiford previously had an appeal to have her sentence reduced rejected.
