Execution date for Australian

CANBERRA - Singapore will hang 25-year-old Australian drug smuggler Nguyen Tuong Van on December 2, despite numerous pleas for clemency.

Lawyer Lex Lasry said Singapore confirmed the date of execution in a letter sent to Nguyen's mother.

Nguyen, of Melbourne, was convicted last year of trying to smuggle 400 grams of heroin from Cambodia in December 2002.

Australia had asked for clemency for Nguyen - who said he was carrying the drugs to help his brother pay off debts to loan sharks - because he could be a star witness in future cases.

He will be the first Australian executed for drugs charges since Michael McAuliffe in Malaysia in 1993 for trafficking.

Two other Australians, Mai Cong Thanh, 46, and Nguyen Van Chinh, 45, are on death row in Vietnam after being convicted of drug smuggling.

- REUTERS