JAKARTA, Nov. 8 (Xinhua) -- Indonesia's anti-graft court on Wednesday sentenced former Minister of Communications and Information Technology Johnny Gerard Plate to 15 years in prison over a corruption case for an internet infrastructure development project in remote areas.
The court also required Plate to pay back 15.5 billion rupiahs (about 990,000 U.S. dollars) in embezzlement funds and a fine of 1 billion rupiahs (about 64,000 dollars) for the corruption case which costs the state more than 8 trillion rupiahs (about 510 million dollars).
The project started in late 2020, aiming to build base transceiver stations for 4G Internet network to provide mobile phone coverage to thousands of villages in remote areas in Indonesia.
The corruption case involves at least seven defendants, including ministry officials, an expert and businessmen. ■
