JAKARTA, INDONESIA - Indonesia's Supreme Court on Friday sentenced a former pilot for national carrier Garuda to 20 years in jail for the murder of a prominent human rights activist, a court official said.

The court overturned its own previous verdict, passed in October 2006, which cleared Pollycarpus Priyanto of a lower court's conviction and a 14-year jail term for the murder of activist Munir Thalib.

Mr Munir died of arsenic poisoning while he was on board a Garuda flight from Singapore to the Netherlands.

The Supreme Court's latest decision came after prosecutors filed a case review, presenting what they said was fresh evidence that Priyanto served Mr Munir with a poison-laced drink while in transit in Singapore's Changi Airport.

'The defendant was proven guilty of premeditated murder,' the Supreme Court's spokesman Djoko Sarwoko told reporters. -- REUTERS