China executes Pinay

MANILA, Philippines - China executed yesterday the fifth Filipino sentenced to death for drug smuggling, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said.

The 35-year-old Filipina was executed yesterday morning, the seventh day after the Philippine consulate general in Shanghai formally received notice on the implementation of the death sentence.

“It is with profound sadness that we confirm our fellow Filipino was executed in China (yesterday) morning. Arrangements for the repatriation of her remains are being undertaken. We hope you understand that we cannot provide other details in deference to the family’s request for privacy,” DFA spokesman Raul Hernandez said in a press briefing.

Hernandez said the woman was put to death two days after she was visited by her family on Monday.

Through Hernandez, the DFA offered condolences to the family of the executed Filipina and pointed out that a lesson should be learned.

“The DFA expresses our deepest sympathies to the family of the Filipina as they mourn the loss of their loved one. We certainly do not want other Filipino families to go through the same experience and therefore we renew our call on our countrymen to avoid involvement with drug syndicates,” Hernandez said.

He emphasized that drug trafficking is a criminal act in the Philippines and all over the world.

“The life of every Filipino is valuable and we pray this is the last time a tragedy like this befalls any of our countrymen,” he added.

Malacañang also condoled with the family of the executed Filipina drug mule and said it should serve as a lesson to all Filipinos.

“We extend our sympathies and condolences to the family. We appeal to the media to allow the family their privacy at this difficult time. However unfortunate, we hope that this will serve as a continuing lesson to our citizens not to allow themselves to be victimized and to fall prey to these syndicates,” deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte said yesterday.

Vice President Jejomar Binay also used his message of condolence to appeal to Filipinos to resist the temptation to serve as drug mules into China.

“It’s not worth it. You are gambling with your life here. There is no amount that is worth your life,” Binay said.

Binay added the family of the executed Filipina wanted her remains to be cremated.

He said the family also requested not to mention her execution and the exact time it was carried out so as not to call the attention of the public.

According to Binay, it was useless for him to go to China to personally appeal the case of the Filipina death convict.

Binay, presidential adviser on overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), admitted he could no longer do anything about it, saying he had been advised by Beijing that it was not the right time to visit.

“It means that first of all we have rule of law. Drugs are a serious offense here (in China). I said, if that were the case, I would lose my dignity and the dignity of my office. That is the message: Don’t come. We cannot do anything about it,” Binay said.

Lawmakers led by Senators Cynthia Villar and Juan Edgardo Angara also offered their sympathies and said the government should provide opportunities for OFWs “to ensure that these types of unfortunate situations no longer happen.”

Angara said the government should “analyze her (executed Filipina’s) situation and that of her family she left behind.”

A drug mule for 16 times

The STAR reported last Thursday the decision of the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) of China upholding a lower court decision sentencing the Filipina drug mule to death this week.

The death convict was one of two Filipinos – the other her male cousin – arrested near Shanghai in January 2011 for carrying over 12 kilos of high-grade heroin stashed in their luggage.

The sentence was handed down by the Intermediate People’s Court in Hangzhou on March 16, 2012 and then appealed before the High People’s Court, which upheld the decision on Dec. 3, 2012.

After its review of the case, the SPC upheld the sentence last June 26.

Hernandez said the government had exerted all efforts and provided the Filipina death convict all legal assistance and ensured her legal rights were observed.

“The Philippine government made sustained representation and exhausted all legal remedies (to stay the execution),” he said

The Chinese court said the Filipina, who was detained at the Hangzhou detention center, had been doing this for 16 times since 2008, going back and forth from Dubai, Hong Kong and China.

The Filipina entered China as a tourist. In 2007, she was allegedly offered $1,000 to act as drug mule and later was offered $3,000 to $4,000 per trip.

The family of the Filipina, who arrived in Shanghai on Sunday, visited her at the detention center in Hangzhou on Monday at around 10 a.m.

The family also visited her male cousin, who was also convicted of drug smuggling but received a two-year reprieve on his death sentence. The family returned to Manila yesterday.

A letter of President Aquino was sent to Chinese President Xi Jinping to appeal the death sentence against the Filipina after she was found guilty of smuggling 6.198 kilos of heroin in China.

Under the Chinese criminal code, the introduction into China of 50 grams of heroin or any narcotic drug is punishable by death.

China first carried out on March 30, 2011 the death sentence on three Filipinos convicted of drug trafficking. Ramon Credo, Sally Ordinario-Villanueva and Elizabeth Batain were executed by lethal injection.

A 35-year-old Filipino sentenced to death for drug trafficking was executed on Dec. 8, 2011 in China by lethal injection despite appeals from President Aquino for a commutation of sentence to life imprisonment.

The executed Filipino was convicted for smuggling 1.495 kilos of heroin to Guangxi, which was upheld by Supreme People’s Court (SPC) in Beijing.

He was arrested in September 2008 upon arrival at the Guilin International Airport from Malaysia.

A total of 213 other Filipinos are in Chinese jails on drug offenses, the DFA said.

Some 28 of them – apart from the woman executed yesterday – have already been sentenced to death but were granted two-year reprieves, the DFA said.

The latest execution comes amid already rocky relations between the two countries, soured by overlapping territorial claims in the South China Sea. – Jose Rodel Clapano, Aurea Calica, Christina Mendez, Mayen Jaymalin