[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Jan. 31


INDIA:

Kasab's death penalty appeal adjourned, no date set


The Supreme Court adjourned an appeal hearing on Tuesday into the death 
sentence handed down to Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving gunman from the 2008 
Mumbai attacks.

Kasab, one of 10 gunmen who laid siege to Mumbai in attacks which lasted nearly 
3 days and killed 166 people, has appealed for his sentence to be overturned 
after he was convicted in May 2010.

The 24-year-old Pakistani was found guilty of a series of crimes, including 
waging war against India, murder and terror acts.

The November 2008 attacks saw 10 heavily-armed Islamist gunmen storm targets 
including luxury hotels, a Jewish centre and a train station.

1 of the 2 Supreme Court judges due to hear the appeal was unavailable on 
Tuesday, forcing the adjournment, officials said. No date was immediately set 
for the next hearing.

Kasab's court-appointed lawyer Raju Ramachandran told AFP that his job was "a 
call of duty", but declined to talk further about the case.

India blames the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militant outfit for 
training, equipping and financing the attack with support from "elements" in 
the Pakistan military.

Kasab's death sentence was confirmed by a state high court in Mumbai last year. 
If he loses his Supreme Court appeal, he will be able to appeal for clemency 
from the president.

Ujjwal Nikam, who prosecuted the case in Mumbai on behalf of the Maharashtra 
state, is seeking to push through the death sentence.

"This is the rarest of rare cases," Nikam told AFP. "He should not be entitled 
to any mercy."

At the trial, the prosecution produced fingerprint, DNA, eyewitness and 
television evidence showing him opening fire and throwing grenades at Mumbai's 
main railway station in the bloodiest episode of the attacks.

Kasab -- who is in jail in Mumbai -- initially pleaded not guilty but later 
made a confession, admitting to being one of the gunmen sent by the banned LeT 
militant group.

He then reverted back to his initial denial and said he was framed by the 
police.

Pakistan has indicted 7 alleged perpetrators over the attacks but they have not 
been brought to trial, triggering Indian accusations that the process is a 
sham.

Pakistani investigators and lawyers will visit India next month to gather more 
evidence ahead of any trial in Islamabad.

Most death sentences in India are commuted to life imprisonment, and convicts 
can sit on death row for years awaiting a final decision.

(source: Hindustan Times)

*****************

Kasab not given fair trial: Amicus curiae tells SC


The sole convict in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack case, Mohammad Ajmal Amir 
Kasab, on Tuesday contended before the Supreme Court that he was not given a 
free and fair trial in the case.

Senior advocate Raju Ramachandran, who has been appointed as amicus curiae by 
the apex court to defend Kasab, told a bench headed by Justice Aftab Alam that 
he was not a part of the larger conspiracy for waging war against nation.

“Even if I am guilty under section 302 (punishment for murder) of the IPC and 
other provisions, it cannot be said that I was a part of the larger conspiracy 
of waging war,” said Mr. Ramachandran.

Maintaining that the prosecution has failed to prove the case against him 
beyond doubts, he told the bench that his right against self-incrimination as 
well as his right to get himself adequately represented by a counsel to defend 
himself in the case have been violated during the trial.

The apex court had on October 10, last year stayed the death sentence of 
24-year-old Kasab, the lone surviving gunman involved in the 2008 Mumbai 
attack.

In the special leave petition filed by Kasab, challenging the Bombay High Court 
judgement, he claimed he was brainwashed like a “robot” into committing the 
heinous crime in the name of “God” and that he does not deserve capital 
punishment owing to his young age.

Kasab has been lodged in Arthur Road prison in Mumbai and had moved the SLP 
through jail authorities. He had challenged his conviction and death sentence 
in the terror attack case.

Kasab along with 9 other Pakistani terrorists had landed at Budhwar Park in 
south Mumbai on November 26, 2008 night from Karachi by sea and had gone on a 
shooting spree at various city landmarks, leaving 166 people dead and many more 
wounded.

While Kasab was captured, the other terrorists in the group were killed during 
the attack. He was sentenced to death by a special anti-terror court on May 6 
last year.

The Bombay High Court had in its February 21, 2011, verdict upheld the trial 
court order of death sentence to Kasab for the “brutal and diabolical” attacks 
aimed at “destabilising” the government.

Kasab’s death penalty was upheld on charges of criminal conspiracy, waging war 
against the nation and various other provisions of the Indian Penal Code and 
the anti-terror law - Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

The High Court had upheld Kasab’s conviction on 19 counts under the IPC, Arms 
Act, Explosives Act, Explosive Substances Act, the Foreigners Act, the Passport 
Act and the Railway Act.

(source: The Hindu)

*********************************

Trial against Salem can't be halted: CBI


The CBI on Tuesday said that they don't accept Portugal Supreme Court's verdict 
which recently confirmed the decision to terminate the extradition of 
underworld don Abu Salem to face trial in various cases in India.

The CBI on Tuesday filed its reply in the special TADA court in Mumbai. This 
reply has been filed after Salem moved the court stating since his extradition 
had been revoked, no trial can continue against him in India.

"We don't accept Portugal SC's verdict. We are governed by the Supreme Court of 
India. We have appealed in the Constitutional Court in Portugal. Trial against 
Salem can't be halted. It's a matter between the 2 governments," the CBI said.

Portugal's Supreme Court had on January 14 upheld an order of Court of Appeal 
in Lisbon which on Salem's petition had canceled his extradition holding that 
by slapping new charges under MCOCA, which attracted death penalty, there was 
breach of deportation rules and Rule of Speciality. 46-year-old Salem, a key 
accused in 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case, and his girl friend Monica Bedi were 
extradited to India on November 11, 2005, after a marathon legal process in 
Portugal lasting 3 years.

The extradition of Salem, who was also wanted in various cases including the 
murder of noted film producer Gulshan Kumar, came after an assurance by the 
Indian government to Portugal that he would not be given death penalty, a key 
requirement for extradition from European countries.

(source: IBNLive.com)

****************************

Honour crimes, the scourge of South Asia----A 'feudal practice' and 'a slur on 
our nation,' India's supreme court says


Killing his own daughter was necessary to protect the family's honour, Bagawan 
Dass argued, and that was why it didn't merit a life sentence.

Dass took his appeal all the way to India's Supreme Court. Because for him and 
others in this part of South Asia, what he did in 2006 was not only his right, 
but his responsibility.

The family's honour and standing in the community had to be protected after 
Dass's daughter married someone against the family's wishes. For them, the life 
sentence didn't fit the crime.

Last May, the Supreme Court of India agreed: it sentenced Dass to death.

It's a ruling that set a precedent in a region where the role and 
permissibility of so-called honour killings have wound their way through 
religion, caste and culture.

In the court's judgment, so-called honour killings "come within the category of 
the rarest of rare cases deserving death punishment."

Now is the time, it said, "to stamp out these barbaric, feudal practices which 
are a slur on our nation."

It was a bold statement, one that Indian politicians have generally been 
reluctant to make.

But while high-up officials and police are being shaken into action by these 
kinds of high-court pronouncements, those in local communities, where the root 
of the problem begins, do not appear to be nearly as moved.

"The community pressure is to go with the stream," says Yogesh Kamdar, a 
Mumbai-based rights activist.

As he sees it, while many cases of honour killings are now publicized, and 
their perpetrators held up to ridicule in the media, many more are believed to 
go unreported.

"And that would only be possible with the collusion of police and the [village] 
administration."

Tougher penalties

Many experts believe there are about 1,000 so-called honour killings a year in 
India, a harsh but relatively small number, it might be said, in a country with 
over a billion people.

But no one can be really sure if this is not just the tip of the iceberg.

Muslim Pakistan next door is often said to have proportionally more of these 
crimes and it, too, appears to be having the same kinds of problems India has 
when it comes to stamping them out.

After years of agitation, Pakistan's legislature passed a law in 2004 
authorizing the death penalty for so-called honour killings. But a few years 
later the country's chief justice was still lamenting the "enabling culture" 
that allowed the practice to continue.

Perhaps that should not be so surprising. For all the headlines you read here 
boasting about, say, India's economic growth or the number of BMWs on the 
roads, there are many more stories about social traditions that are locked in 
the past.

That's why some activists are starting to argue for stricter penalties (no 
bail, for example, being the latest cause), not just for those who commit these 
crimes, but for those responsible for enforcing the laws and who might turn a 
blind eye.

Already, tougher action against lower officials has had some effect, with 
officers being suspended or even dismissed in the past year.

"This sends a positive signals to the lower levels of enforcement that they 
have to hold up the constitution and not their own personal convictions," 
Kamdar says. "But this is happening gradually."

Rights and caste

Through the centuries, so-called honour killings have become deeply rooted in 
cultural and social norms — and not just in rural and urbanizing India but 
around the world.

On Monday, the BBC reported that a woman in Afghanistan was arrested for 
allegedly strangling her daughter-in-law because she had given birth to a 3rd 
daughter.

In May 2010, police in the Indian state of Jharkhand arrest the mother of a 
pregnant journalist who was killed, allegedly for wanting to marry her 
boyfriend from another caste. A UN study in 2000 suggested there were as many 
as 5,000 women and girls killed each year by a family member as part of some 
so-called honour crime. These incidents involved Muslim, Hindu and Christian 
families in South Asia, the Middle East, North Africa and as far away as 
Ecuador and Brazil.

Such crimes are also showing up in Canada, the U.S. and Europe among immigrant 
communities. Britain, Italy and Germany have all convicted people for the 
so-called honour killing of a close family member in the past 4 years.

Last month, Britain's Guardian newspaper reported that U.K. police forces, 
asked to compile lists, came up with more than 2,800 cases of so-called honour 
crimes, including killings, abuse and intimidation, in 2010.

There has even been a case of a British court taking a proactive stance by 
allowing an unmarried Muslim woman to have her child adopted, against the 
natural father's wishes, in order to prevent the woman's father finding out 
about the child and doing something to protect family honour.

Marriage and control

Rajana Kumari, who heads a New Delhi-based non-governmental organization for 
women's rights, says the notion that killing a woman is permissible basically 
stems from discrimination against children and women.

"It's the mindset that women have no rights to decide," she explains. "That 
once a decision is made, the family takes any challenge to that decision as a 
challenge to culture and family and values."

Most of these cases deal with disputes between girls and their parents over 
marriage and control. In the past few years alone, stories of fathers axing 
their daughters to death for seeing a boy from another caste, or a brother 
shooting his sister because she ran off with someone the family did not approve 
of, regularly crop up in the media.

In Hindu India, Kumari says, these incidents largely stem from the rules 
surrounding caste. "If you marry outside your caste you are going outside the 
norm and bringing dishonour."

She adds that the tradition of caste and control over a woman's body is very 
patriarchal and a central reason why the killings are usually done by the 
woman's family.

"In sociological terms, when a woman marries she goes into the husband's caste. 
Men maintain caste if they marry lower caste, not women. So women bring the 
family status down if they marry to a lower, or even just another caste."

Economic independence

Today, there are several countries trying to tackle the scourge of these crimes 
by top-down decree.

A few years ago, well before all the recent unrest, Syria's senior clerics 
denounced them as un-Islamic; Turkey set up a special department to try to 
track and prosecute them; and Jordan recently eliminated the "fit-of-fury" 
defence, which some courts had granted perpetrators.

But the greatest liberator might yet be the economy. As many more women join 
the workforce, more are also gaining independence along with their paycheques.

"It has to do with education and women becoming more economically independent," 
Kumari says.

"Because of the economy in India now, women are leaving their homes, without 
having to get married. And they have more power and means to make their own 
decisions."

In the long run, this kind of sociological change may reduce the number of 
so-called honour crimes. But the mentality that provokes them in the 1st place 
will likely take more than a fistful of rupees to overcome.

(source: CBC News)






SAUDI ARABIA----execution

Saudi Arabia beheads Pakistani drugs smuggler


Saudi Arabia has beheaded a Pakistani man who was arrested for trying to 
smuggle drugs into the kingdom, the interior ministry has said.

"Salman Khan Taj Mohammad, a Pakistani... was arrested as he was caught 
smuggling a large amount of heroin" into the country, the Gulfnews quoted the 
ministry, as saying in a statement.

He was interrogated and convicted of drug smuggling, a crime punishable by 
death according to the kingdom's laws.

Reports have suggested that the man was beheaded in Dammam in eastern Saudi 
Arabia, bringing to five the number of Saudi executions carried out so far in 
2012.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights voiced alarm this month 
over the increase in executions in Saudi Arabia last year.

Saudi Arabia applies the death penalty for a wide range of offences, including 
rape, murder, apostasy, armed robbery and drug trafficking.

At least 76 death row inmates were executed in 2011, while Amnesty 
International said the kingdom executed 79 people last year. In 2010, 27 people 
were reportedly executed.

(source: ANI)






JAPAN:

CABINET INTERVIEW----Justice minister feels signing off on hangings just part 
of job description


Toshio Ogawa is the first justice minister to tacitly support capital 
punishment since the Democratic Party of Japan came to power in September 2009 
and has no intention of engaging in the debate over whether to end the death 
penalty.

He said the study group weighing the possibility of abolishing capital 
punishment has run out of things to discuss.

"Whether or not the death sentence should be kept had been discussed in depth 
before the study group was set up (in September 2010 by then Justice Minister 
Keiko Chiba).

"It has not yielded any new opinions and it is a waste of time to listen to the 
same opinions," Ogawa told journalists in his Tokyo office Jan. 23.

"We are done discussing and are now in the midst of compiling opinions, and 
will make an announcement when everything is compiled," he said.

Ogawa, who passed the bar in 1970 and served as a judge, prosecutor and lawyer 
before becoming a lawmaker, was senior vice justice minister for a year to last 
September in Naoto Kan's administration.

The study group was never tasked with coming up with proposals. Chiba, who 
signed the orders for 2 hangings despite her personal beliefs, established the 
group because she wanted nationwide discussions on capital punishment.

Ogawa reiterated he feels it is his responsibility as justice minister to sign 
off on executions.

"I don't really want to do it, but that is one of the justice minister's job 
descriptions. With 130 inmates on death row and public opinion showing 85 % of 
Japanese support the death sentence, it is inexcusable not to sign off on 
executions," he said.

No hangings have taken place since Chiba, a DPJ member, gave the go-ahead for 
the 2 executions in July 2010.

The frequency of executions appears to vary depending on the justice minister 
at the time. Other than the 2 inmates sent to the gallows in 2010, 7 were 
hanged in 2009, 15 in 2008, nine in 2007 and 4 in 2006.

Japan is one of 58 countries, including the United States, China, India and 
Iran, where executions take place. A total of 104 countries, including all 
European countries, Canada and Australia, either have abolished the death 
sentence or have not resorted to its use in years, according to Amnesty 
International.

Ogawa said he has not ruled out signing off on executions while the Diet is in 
session. Past justice ministers have generally refrained from having anyone 
executed during legislative sessions, apparently to avoid coming under fire 
from fellow lawmakers.

Ogawa said he is neutral on calls for establishing an alternative punishment, 
such as life in prison with no chance of parole. Some argue this sentence is 
necessary because the gap in harshness between hanging and life with possible 
parole is too wide.

"I think it is extremely painful if inmates have no possibility of parole. They 
may give in to despair. On the other hand, it is better than death," he said.

On whether to allow shared child custody in cases of divorce, Ogawa effectively 
said Japan does not need to revise the Civil Code to allow this, because 
ensuring visitation rights is sufficient.

The Civil Code stipulates that custody, or "parental rights," over children 
must belong to one of the parents in a divorce. This provision is one of the 
reasons foreign or Japanese parents who lose custody have difficulty playing a 
role in their children's lives.

"If we allow dual parental rights, it will be difficult to decide which parent 
the children live with and to make other decisions. I believe a major complaint 
that people seeking dual parental rights have is that they don't get to see 
their children enough. That can be largely solved by ensuring visitation 
rights," he said.

Japan is under pressure to revise family laws to ratify the Hague Convention on 
the Civil Aspect of International Child Abduction, under which countries must 
return children abducted from another country that has signed the agreement to 
the country of their original residence.

(source: Japan Times)