Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on Thursday that the city state is unable to change its decision of not granting clemency to Nguyen Tuong Van.

Nguyen, a 25-year-old Australian, had been sentenced to death by a Singapore court last year after being found guilty of smuggling almost 400 grams of pure heroin from Cambodia to Australia via Singapore.

The statement said that Singapore's Foreign Minister George Yeo had written to his Australian counterpart Alexander Downer on Wednesday, stressing that the decision is unable to be changed because of "the seriousness of the offense and the need to hold firm the national position against drug trafficking".

He noted that the city state had carefully considered all relevant factors of this case including Nguyen's sad personal circumstances and his value as a potential source of information.

Yeo added that the Singapore government has the responsibility to protect its people from the scourge of drug addiction and to prevent the country from becoming a conduit for the trafficking of illicit drugs in the region.

Source: Xinhua