JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — The remaining five Australians from the Bali Nine group who are serving life sentences for drug smuggling in Indonesia could be repatriated home this month as Indonesia and Australia put finishing touches on a draft proposal for their transfer, Indonesia's senior law minister said Tuesday.
The Indonesian government is awaiting Australia's response to key points related to the transfer arrangements, including provisions requiring Australia to acknowledge Indonesia’s sovereignty, respect the rulings of Indonesian courts and ensure that the five maintain their prisoner status after returning home, Yusril Ihza Mahendra told reporters.
“I hope that we can find an understanding on that, agreed on the draft. And we hope that we can finalize these matters in December,” Mahendra said after meeting Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke in Jakarta.
Burke said the proposal "is a significant step forward and shows significant goodwill. We now need to work through the issues within each country and we’ll we will be doing that without delay.”
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last month appealed to Indonesia's new President Prabowo Subianto to allow their repatriation.
Two convicted ringleaders of the Bali Nine, Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, were executed by a firing squad in 2015, causing a diplomatic furor between neighbors Indonesia and Australia. Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen died from cancer in prison in May.
The nine were arrested in an attempt to smuggle 8.3 kilograms (18.3 pounds) of heroin from Indonesia’s resort island of Bali to Australia in 2005,
The five are serving life sentences without the possibility of parole. Renae Lawrence, the only woman in the group, was released and returned to Australia in 2018.
Of the five, Si Yi Chen and Matthew Norman are held in Bali’s Kerobokan Prison, while the others have been transferred to facilities elsewhere.
For years, they have sought clemency ahead of Indonesia’s Independence Day. Each request has gone unanswered, underscoring the country’s hard line stance on drug offenses.
Last month, Indonesia agreed to repatriate to the Philippines a death-row drug convict who was nearly executed by firing squad but got a reprieve due to years of pleadings from Manila.
Associated Press writer Rod McGuirk, in Melbourne, Australia, contributed to this report.
Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke, right, speaks Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Legal, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Affairs, Yusril Ihza Mahendra, listens during a press conference after their meeting in Jakarta, Indonesia, Tuesday, Dec. 3, 2024. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)
Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke, right, walks with Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Legal, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Affairs, Yusril Ihza Mahendra, during their meeting in Jakarta, Indonesia, Tuesday, Dec. 3, 2024. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)
Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke, right, listens to Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Legal, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Affairs, Yusril Ihza Mahendra, during a press conference after their meeting in Jakarta, Indonesia, Tuesday, Dec. 3, 2024. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)
Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke, left, shakes hands with Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Legal, Human Rights, Immigration and Correctional Affairs, Yusril Ihza Mahendra, during their meeting in Jakarta, Indonesia, Tuesday, Dec. 3, 2024. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)
HONG KONG (AP) — The U.S. Defense Department has added dozens of Chinese companies, including games and technology company Tencent, artificial intelligence firm SenseTime and the world’s biggest battery maker CATL, to a list of companies it says have ties to China’s military, prompting some to protest and say they will seek to have the decision reversed.
In recent years, Washington has sought to restrict sharing of advanced technology, including semiconductors and AI, deeming it to be a threat to national security.
The U.S. Defense Department updates its list of “Chinese Military Companies,” or CMC list, annually. With the latest revision, it includes 134 companies. The National Defense Authorization Act of 2024 bans the Defense Department from dealing with the designated companies beginning in June 2026.
Tencent's Hong Kong-traded shares fell 7.3% on Tuesday and the company said it would “initiate a reconsideration process to correct this mistake,” seek talks with the U.S. Defense Department and if need be take legal measures to get it removed from the list. Tencent is the world's largest video gaming company and operates Chinese messaging platform WeChat.
“As the company is neither a Chinese military company nor a military-civil fusion contributor to the Chinese defense industrial base, it believes that its inclusion in the CMC List is a mistake,” Tencent said in an announcement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
“Unlike other lists maintained by the U.S. Government for sanctions or export control measures, inclusion in the CMC List relates only to U.S. defense procurement, which does not affect the business of the Group,” it said.
Battery maker CATL said in a statement posted on its website that the company “has never engaged in any military-related business or activities," and said that the designation wouldn't have adverse impact on its operations.
Like Tencent, CATL maintains that its inclusion to the list was a “mistake” and that it would proactively engage with the Pentagon to “address the false designation” and take legal action if necessary to protect company and stakeholder interest. CATL's stock fell 2.84% in Shenzhen.
AI company SenseTime said in a statement that the decision to include it on the list had “no factual basis.”
“We firmly disagree with it,” SenseTime’s statement said, adding that the decision has “no material impact on our global operations.”
“SenseTime remains firmly committed to working collaboratively with the relevant stakeholders to address this matter, and to safeguarding the interests of the company and our shareholders,” the company said.
During a daily news briefing, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Guo Jiakun urged the U.S. to “immediately correct its wrong practices, and lift the illegal unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction on Chinese companies.”
“China consistently and firmly opposes the U.S. overstretching the concept of national security, creating discriminatory lists under various pretexts, and unwarrantedly suppressing Chinese companies, hindering China’s high-quality development,” Guo said.
The Chinese and United States flags are flown outside the China International Supply Chain Expo in Beijing, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)
FILE -FILE - Members of the media take photos of the latest Freevoy Super Hybrid Battery from Chinese battery manufacturer Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL) during a launch event in Beijing, Oct. 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
FILE - The booth for Chinese artificial intelligence company Sensetime demonstrates its AI generated images during the World AI Conference in Shanghai, July 5, 2023. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
FILE - A man rides past the Tencent headquarters in Beijing, China on Aug. 7, 2020. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
FILE - The American and Chinese flags wave at Genting Snow Park ahead of the 2022 Winter Olympics, Feb. 2, 2022, in Zhangjiakou, China. (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File)
