A teenage girl is facing the death penalty after claiming she was tricked into smuggling drugs into Indonesia in her luggage.

Brazilian national Manuela Vitoria de Araujo Farias, 19, was caught with three kilos of the drug as she flew into the island of Bali.

Under Indonesia’s tough anti-drug laws, she could face execution by firing squad if she is convicted of trafficking.

Her lawyer Davi Lira da Silva claims she was tricked into cooperating after the gang who hired her told her of temples on the island where they pray for the sick.

Fari’s mother had recently suffered a stroke and, her lawyers say, she was going to seek Buddhist prayers for a cure.

She said: “They said that she could pray in the temples to ask for her mother’s healing.”

Despite the international publicity, her mother, who is seriously ill in Greater Florianopolis, has apparently not been told that her daughter has been arrested.

Police in Santa Catarina in Brazil have refused to discuss the status of the investigation into the alleged criminals that gave the teenage girl the drugs.

She was arrested in Indonesia at Bali International Airport with three kilos of cocaine in her luggage after passing through airports in Brazil and Qatar.