Shanmugam Murugesu, 38, a former star athlete who was convicted of trying to import 1029.8 grams (36 ounces) of cannabis, is expected to be hanged at Changi Prison in three weeks' time, his lawyer, M. Ravi, said.

"I just got a letter from the Istana (the presidential office) dated April 22nd," Ravi told AFP.

The letter said that the president "after due consideration of the petition and on the advice of the cabinet had decided that the sentence of death should stand," according to Ravi.

Murugesu, who was arrested at a checkpoint while coming from Malaysia on August 29, 2003, was convicted and sentenced to death by the High Court in April last year.

Civil rights activists in Singapore are using Murugesu's case to mount a renewed campaign to abolish the death penalty in the affluent island-republic, where voices of dissent against the government are rarely heard.

Human rights group Amnesty International in a report last year singled out Singapore for executing more people than any other country relative to its population and renewed calls for it to abolish the death penalty.

Sinapan Samydorai, executive director of the Think Centre civil rights group, said there were currently eight other people on death row in Singapore.

In their appeal, the activists had highlighted the fact that Murugesu had served in the armed forces for eight years and represented the country in the 1995 World Championship Jetski Finals in the United States.

On the advice of Murugesu's lawyer, his twin sons, now aged 14 and living with their grandmother, had gone on a public campaign to save their father by distributing leaflets calling on people to write directly to the president.


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