Saturday, February 21, 2015

Brazil’s Rousseff Refuses to Receive Credentials of Indonesia Ambassador

2/21/2015

BRASILIA – Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff refused Friday to receive the credentials of the new ambassador from Indonesia, a country that last month executed by firing squad a Brazilian drug trafficker and currently holds another on death row.

Indonesian diplomat Toto Riyanto should have delivered his letter of credence Friday at a ceremony in which the same was done by the new ambassadors from Venezuela, Maria Lourdes Urbaneja; from Panama, Edwin Emilio Vergara; from El Salvador, Diana Marcela Vanegas, and several others.

But though he attended the ceremony, Riyanto was told that the president would not receive his credentials, which means he will not be able to officially represent Indonesia in this country.

“We believe the situation must evolve in order to be clear about the state of our relations with Indonesia,” Rousseff told reporters after the ceremony.

According to the president, what she did “was to delay the reception of the credentials, no more than that.”

Last Jan. 17, the Brazilian Marco Archer Cardoso Moreira was executed by firing squad in Indonesia, where he had been sentenced to death for drug trafficking.

The execution was carried out despite several pleas for clemency from Rousseff, who on that same day recalled for consultation the Brazilian ambassador to Indonesia, and said that “the death penalty, which international society increasingly condemns, seriously affects relations” between the two countries.

Rousseff also asked for clemency for Rodrigo Muxfeldt Gularte, another Brazilian who remains on death row in Indonesia as the date of his execution is being determined.

In the case of Muxfeldt Gularte, authorities of that Asian nation have admitted that he suffers from schizophrenia, the reason why Brazil has insisted that instead of being executed he should be hospitalized, though no response from Indonesia has yet been forthcoming.


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