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Indonesia Executes Eight Foreigners Today

Nine prisoners, including two Australians, are to be executed by firing squad in Indonesia later today.

Australian foreign minister Julie Bishop said she had received a letter from her Indonesian counterpart on Monday advising her there would be no reprieve for smugglers Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan.

"They gave no indication that (Indonesian) President (Joko) Widodo would change his mind and grant the clemency that we have sought," she said.

Family members paid their final visit to the pair and wailed in grief as empty white coffins arrived at Besi prison.

Crosses to be used for the coffins, inscribed with the date 29.04.2015, have also been made. The dates on the crosses were later covered up.

Chan, 31, and Sukumaran, 33, are among nine mainly foreign prisoners scheduled to be killed around 6pm BST.

Four Nigerians, an Indonesian, a Brazilian and a Filipino have also been told they will soon face the firing squad.

Indonesia has harsh punishments for drug crimes and resumed executions in 2013 after a five-year gap.

Chan and Sukumaran - ringleaders of a group of Australian smugglers who became known as the Bali Nine - were arrested at the main airport on the holiday island in 2005 for trying to smuggle 8kg of heroin to Australia.

They both face being tied to wooden planks in a field and shot by a firing squad of 12 police officers aiming at the heart.

They will be given the signal to fire by a commander dropping a sword.

However, only three of the squad will fire live rounds, so as not to identify the executioners.

According to the execution procedure, which is laid down in Indonesian law, if the first round of bullets does not kill them, they will be shot in the head.

Medical staff will then pronounce death before their bodies are handed over to their families.

Chan married his Indonesian girlfriend at the jail in Nusakambangan prison island with family and friends on Monday - his final wish.

Death row convicts in Indonesia can request spiritual counsellors in their final hours, but Australian media said Chan and Sukumaran had seen theirs rejected.

"Last bit of dignity denied," Chan's brother Michael told Fairfax Media in a text.

In Australia, celebrities including Oscar-winning Geoffrey Rush have lobbied for Prime Minister Tony Abbott to fly to Indonesia to help save the two.

Protests have also taken place outside the Indonesian embassy in Manila.