Indonesia to Build Prison Guarded by Tigers and Surrounded by Crocodiles for Drug Traffickers

 In a very controversial move that has gained international condemnation, a country wants to take the fight against drug trafficking to another level by building a prison guarded by tigers, piranhas and crocodiles.

Chief Comr. Gen. Budi Waseso

A controversial drug tsar has announced plans to house drug traffickers in a prison surrounded by a moat full of crocodiles. The chief of Indonesia's National Narcotics Agency Budi Waseso was ridiculed when he made the statement last month. But he has since said he is deadly serious and is thinking of employing man-eating piranhas and tigers as guards as well.

 He told the media: "It is also possible we may use piranhas, and because the number of personnel at the prison might not be enough, we can also use tigers.

 "You can't bribe crocodiles. You can't convince them to let inmates escape ."

 Waseso had embarked on a tour of the country to find "the most ferocious type of crocodile" to guard the jail, which is to be for drug convicts who have been sentenced to death.

 

 He has already obtained two crocodiles from a farm to study their power and aggression and may ultimately put as many as 1,000 in place to keep convicts from escaping.

 "The number will depend on how big the area is, or whether perhaps to combine them with piranhas," he told reporters, according to the rimanews.com portal.

"Because the (prison) personnel numbers are short we can use wild animals. We could use tigers too - for conservation at the same time."

 Anti-drugs agency spokesman Slamet Pribadi confirmed Waseso was also weighing the possibility of tigers and piranhas as guards, and hit back at suggestions the prison island plan was a joke.

  "This is serious, this is not a joke," Pribadi told AFP.

 "Drug trafficking is an extraordinary crime and therefore the fight must also be extraordinary, we cannot fight the usual way."

 

Indonesia has some of the harshest anti-drugs laws in the world, including death by firing squad for traffickers. The country sparked international uproar in April when it put to death eight foreign drug convicts, including Australian Bali Nine duo Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran.

 A ninth prisoner set to face the firing squad, Filipino woman Mary Jane Veloso, received a last-minute temporary reprieve. British gran Lindsay Sandiford, 59, has been facing the death penalty since being sentenced for trying to smuggle cocaine into Bali in 2013. In separate comments on the TV One channel, Waseso rejected critics who said his plans to use animals as jailors were trampling on the human rights of convicts.

 "We have to look at the whole problem," he said. "These people are murderers - mass murderers. Shouldn't we also look at the human rights of their victims?"

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