AUSTRALIA WOULD SEEK CLEMENCY IN INDONESIAN DRUGS CASE

Australia would seek clemency if an Australian woman facing drugs
trafficking charges in Indonesia's tourist island of Bali should be
sentenced to death, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said on Thursday.

Schapelle Leigh Corby, 27, was arrested at Denpasar airport on Oct. 9 with
4.2 kilograms of high-grade cannabis in a bodyboard bag after arriving on a
flight from Sydney.

Indonesian police have said it was the largest quantity of cannabis ever
seized being taken into Bali.

The beauty therapy student, from the touristic Gold Coast in Queensland
state, is facing prosecution under Indonesian legislation that orders death
as the maximum penalty for importing drugs.

She has maintained her innocence. "That's a long way down the track from
now and there is a great deal of legal process to go through before you
would ever end up in that situation, if you did end up in that situation,"
Downer told commercial radio. "But we would always plead for an
Australian's life in that situation." Australia is also attempting to
intervene in the case of an Australian facing death for heroin trafficking
in Singapore, although Downer did not express much optimism about the
chances of success.

Nguyen Tuong Van, 24, of Mulgrave in Melbourne's south-east, on Oct. 20
lost an appeal against his conviction and mandatory death sentence for drug
trafficking under Singapore law.

"In the case of Singapore, there haven't been many cases where presidential
clemency has been granted," Downer said.