Sentence reduction ‘upsetting’

Australia’s leader said it’s upsetting Indonesia has further reduced the prison sentence of the bombmaker in the Bali terror attack that killed 202 people — meaning the terrorist could be freed within days if he’s granted parole.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he’d been told by Indonesian authorities that Umar Patek’s sentence had been reduced by another five months, taking his total reductions to almost two years.

That means Patek could be released on parole ahead of the 20th anniversary of the bombings in October.

“This will cause further distress to Australians who were the families of victims of the Bali bombings,” Albanese said. “We lost 88 Australian lives in those bombings.”

Albanese said he would continue making “diplomatic representations” to Indonesia about Patek’s sentence and a range of other issues, including Australians currently jailed in Indonesia. Albanese described Patek as “abhorrent”.

“His actions were the actions of a terrorist,” Albanese told Channel 9. “They did have such dreadful results for Australian families that are ongoing, the trauma which is there.”

Indonesia often grants sentence reductions to prisoners on major holidays such as the nation’s Independence Day, which was Wednesday.

Patek received a 5-month reduction for good behaviour and could walk free this month from Porong Prison in East Java province if he gets parole, said Zaeroji, who heads the provincial office for the Ministry of Law and Human Rights.