Indonesian police burns mountain of marijuana

A towering stack of marijuana that weighed a hefty 800 kilograms (1,760 pounds) went up in smoke Thursday as Indonesian police lit up the pungent contraband. Authorities in the Muslim-majority nation’s Aceh province took a match to the bricks of pot and also destroyed some 19 kilogrammes of methamphetamine, seized in raids this year.

Five drug suspects in bright-orange prison garb were paraded around the ceremony. Aceh is a deeply conservative region at the tip of Sumatra island that publicly whips criminals for a range of offences including gambling, drinking alcohol, and having gay sex or relations outside of marriage. Indonesia also has some of the world’s strictest drug laws.

This month, five foreigners were arrested in Bali for drug trafficking, with a German and Peruvian possibly facing execution if convicted.