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Singapore executes Australian
 Khoa Nguyen, right, hugs a prison worker before leaving the Singapore Changi Prison Friday after his brother's execution. RELATEDQUICKVOTEYOUR E-MAIL ALERTS(CNN) -- Singapore's government hanged an Australian man for drug trafficking early Friday, hours after making an exception to prison policy by letting the condemned man's mother hold her son's hand one last time. Van Nguyen was hanged at 6 a.m. (10 p.m. Thursday GMT) as a dozen friends and supporters, dressed in black, kept an overnight vigil outside the maximum-security prison. His twin brother, Nguyen Khoa, was dressed in white. "The sentence was carried out this morning at Changi Prison," Singapore's Home Affairs Ministry said in a statement. The statement said Nguyen had failed in his appeals to the Court of Appeal, and to President S.R. Nathan for clemency. A dozen friends and supporters had stood outside the maximum-security Changi Prison hours before the hanging. Candles and handwritten notes containing messages of support and calls for an end to Singapore's death penalty were placed outside the prison gates. Nguyen's twin brother entered the prison compound, but did not attend the execution, The Associated Press reported. As the brother left, he hugged a prison officer and shook the hand of another. Van Nguyen had said he was trafficking heroin to help pay off his twin brother's debts. In an unexpected concession, prison authorities granted his mother, Kim Nguyen, permission to hold hands with her son through a visiting-room grille during a final visit -- but would not allow a hug, his lawyer, Julian McMahon, said. The execution had sparked protest in Australia. Nguyen, 25, was arrested in December 2002 at Singapore's Changi Airport after police found him carrying almost a pound of heroin. He said he was trying to pay off his brother's debt to a loan shark. Australia abolished capital punishment in 1967, and it had urged Singapore to commute the sentence. The issue sparked demonstrations in the Australian capital Canberra, and Attorney General Philip Ruddock called the scheduled hanging "barbaric." "Our view is that there were extenuating circumstances. They ought to have been heard," Ruddock told reporters Thursday. Vigils were held across Australia Thursday and Friday, with bells and gongs sounding 25 times at the hour of his execution, The Associated Press reported. "I have told the prime minister of Singapore that I believe it will have an effect on the relationship on a people-to-people, population-to-population basis," Australian Prime Minister John Howard told Melbourne radio station 3AW shortly before Singapore confirmed the hanging, according to the AP. Singapore has stringent drug laws; drug trafficking is one of several crimes that carry a mandatory death sentence there. The city-state is part of a region that carries tough penalties for nonviolent crimes. (Full story) With about 4.4 million people, Singapore has the world's highest rate of executions by population, according to the human rights group Amnesty International. It conducted 19 executions in 2003 and six in 2004, Amnesty reported. Singapore says its tough laws and penalties for drug trafficking are an effective deterrent against a crime that ruins lives, and that foreigners and Singaporeans must be treated alike. It said Nguyen's appeals for clemency were carefully considered. "We take a very serious view of drug trafficking -- the penalty is death," Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said Thursday during a visit to Germany, according to the AP. Loong said the amount of drugs Nguyen was caught carrying -- about 400 grams (14 ounces) -- was enough to yield 26,000 doses of heroin. But Sinapan Samydorai, president of the Singapore human rights organization Think Center, called that charge an exaggeration. Journalist Chris Reson contributed to this report. Copyright 2005 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report. 
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