(from Reuters) - "Eight drug convicts were executed by an Indonesian firing squad early on Wednesday but a Filipina who was on death row with the Australians, Nigerians, a Brazilian and an Indonesian was unexpectedly not among them, local media reports said."
Watch the CNN Video why she was reprieve at the last minute here.
"We've carried out the executions," said an Attorney General’s Office (AGO) official, talking to the press on condition of anonymity.
The eight were Indonesian Zainal Abidin, Australians Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, Brazilian Rodrigo Gularte, Nigerians Sylvester Obiekwe Nwolise, Raheem Agbaje Salami and Okwudili Oyatanze, Ghanaian Martin Anderson.
Mary Jane Fiesta Veloso of the Philippines was spared after a woman who allegedly recruited her to act as a drug courier gave himself up to police in the Philippines on Tuesday.
"The executions were carried out at 12:30 a.m.," Suhendro Putro, funeral director with the Javanese Christian Church (GKJ) in Cilacap, said in a short message service.
AGO spokesman Tony Spontana said the government had agreed to the final requests fielded by two Australian death-row convicts for their bodies to be flown to Australia for burial.
A Cilacap Police officer said that after the executions, prayers were said for each person according to their respective religion. "The executions went well, without any disruptions," he said.
The AGO stated that the executions had been carried out after it had heard all eight convicts’ final requests.
The execution was the second round after the first was carried out on Jan. 18, during which six inmates from Indonesia, the Netherlands, Brazil, Nigeria, Vietnam and Malawi were killed by firing squad.
UPDATE via the Guardian:
The reprieve is said to be a temporary one, however.
Earlier today, the Philippines government sent an “extremely urgent” letter to the Indonesian attorney-general asking for a “suspension of execution of the death sentence”.
This followed news that Maria Kristina Sergio, the woman who allegedly recruited Veloso as a (she says unwitting) drugs courier, apparently handed herself into police in the Philippines.
Reports tonight say Veloso’s death sentence has been postponed so that she can act as a witness in any trial of Sergio.
Indonesian television is also reporting that the executions of eight prisoners – all men – have taken place, but that the Filipina woman,
Mary Jane Veloso, was spared at the last minute, after a woman accused of tricking her into carrying drugs turned herself into police in the Philippines on Tuesday."
Mary Jane Veloso, was spared at the last minute, after a woman accused of tricking her into carrying drugs turned herself into police in the Philippines on Tuesday."
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