[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Oct. 26



VIETNAM:

Last Minute Appeal in Disputed Death Penalty Case in Vietnam


A group of lawyers have petitioned President Truong Tan Sang for the reprieve 
of a death row inmate, who was acquitted twice on appeal, but is now scheduled 
to die on Sunday.

The lawyers said that Le Van Manh appeared to have been a scapegoat in a case 
in which the proper legal procedures were not followed.

The People's Court in Thanh Hoa province has given the go ahead for the death 
sentence, following Manh's conviction on charges of murder, child rape and 
robbery.

His original convictions were overturned twice on appeal. However, the death 
sentence imposed at Manh's 3rd trial was upheld.

Manh's mother says that he was tortured into making a confession for the crimes 
and that he has an alibi that proves he could not have been present at the time 
of the crime.

He was accused of raping and strangling to death a 15-year-old girl by the 
banks of a river near his home town.

In their letter, the lawyers said the only evidence produced against Manh was 
his confession. At his trial he had denied involvement in the murder.

They said that courts could not convict on the strength of such a confession 
alone and that doing so was a violation of clause 2, article 72, of the 
criminal code.

Manh's mother has made an emotional appeal on Youtube for his reprieve.

She said that he was arrested without a warrant or summons and was subjected to 
torture in prison.

She said he was beaten into unconsciousness and suspended by a rope during the 
interrogation sessions and had no option but to confess.

The lawyers said that they had tried to submit an appeal at the Supreme 
People's Court but had received no response from officials there.

(source: newamericanmedia.org)






SAUDI ARABIA:

Saudi Arabia court confirms death penalty for Shia cleric al-Nimr


The Saudi Arabia's Supreme Court has confirmed the death sentence against Shia 
cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, a leader of anti-government protests.

"After the confirmation of Sheikh Nimr's death sentence by the Court of Appeal 
and then the Supreme Court, his life is in the hands of King Salman who can 
endorse the sentence or suspend the execution," said one of his brothers, 
Mohammed al-Nimr.

He warned his brother's execution "could provoke reactions that we do not 
want," as Sheikh Nimr had "supporters in the Shia areas of the Islamic world".

Mohammed al-Nimr said he expected the king to "prove his wisdom" by halting the 
execution of his brother and six other Shias, the Aljazeera reported.

Among those sentenced to death, "3, including my son Ali, were minors at the 
time of arrest" for involvement in anti-government protests that erupted in the 
Eastern Province in the wake of the Arab Spring, he said.

The case of Ali al-Nimr, in particular, has aroused strong reactions around the 
world, with many asking the Saudi authorities to grant the young Shia a stay 
the execution.

Iran, the arch-foe of Saudi Arabia, on Sunday warned Riyadh not to execute the 
cleric.

"The execution of Sheikh Nimr would have dire consequences for Saudi Arabia," 
said Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian.

"The situation in Saudi Arabia is not good and provocative and tribal attitudes 
against its own citizens are not in the government's interests," he said in a 
statement.

Sheikh Nimr had called in 2009 for separating the Eastern Province's 
Shia-populated Qatif and Al-Ihsaa governorates from Saudi Arabia and uniting 
them with Shia-majority Bahrain.

Last year a special court in Riyadh sentenced him to death for "sedition", 
"disobedience" and "bearing arms".

Saudi Arabia's estimated 2 million Shias, who frequently complain of 
marginalisation, live mostly in the east, where the vast majority of the OPEC 
kingpin's huge oil reserves lie.

(source: Daily Pakistan)

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

Iran censures Saudi court for upholding death sentence against al-Nimr


Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has condemned a decree 
by the Saudi Supreme Court approving the death sentence against prominent Shia 
cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr.

The diplomat said the confirmation of the verdict by the Saudi court is 
worrying, Mehr reported on Sunday.

The Supreme Court earlier the day approved the death penalty for al-Nimr, his 
brother says.

Mohammad al-Nimr, the cleric's brother, said in a message on social media on 
Sunday that the Saudi Supreme Court and an appellate court had approved the 
execution of the Shia cleric and authorized the Saudi Interior Ministry to 
carry out the sentence.

(source: Tehran Times)






PAKISTAN:

Murder convict to be hanged in Dera Ghazi Khan


A convicted murderer will be hanged to death on Tuesday at the Central Jail in 
Dera Ghazi Khan.

According to prison sources, Abdul Majeed son of Ghulam Hussain, resident of 
Chah Gulwala tehsil Taunsa, had killed his brother Ali Ahmed and nephew Abdul 
Aziz on November 22, 2002 over property dispute.

A case under section 302 was registered at Ratera Police station.

The Additional Sessions Judge Ishtiaq Ahmed awarded death penalty to the 
culprit on April 29, 2003.

Mercy appeals of the outlaw were rejected at all relevant forums.

The death penalty would be executed on October 27 under the supervision of 
Prison Superintendent Afzal Javed and Dr Ayub.

Nearly 250 persons who were convicted to death by various courts across the 
country have been executed since the ban on the implementation of death penalty 
was lifted in July last year.

Initially, only terror convicts were hanged to death as per the permission but 
later the implementation on all death sentences awarded to people for 
committing murder like crimes began.

(source: dnd.com.pk)






AUSTRALIA:

Submission on Australia's Advocacy for the Abolition of the Death Penalty To 
the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade


This submission proposes steps the Australian government should take to promote 
abolition of the death penalty worldwide. Australia has led or cosponsored 
important resolutions at the United Nations Human Rights Council on abolition 
of the death penalty. Australia has also raised death penalty issues through 
the Universal Periodic Review process for relevant countries. Continued 
pressure through various UN mechanisms is helpful and necessary.

Australia's efforts would be more effective if senior Australian officials and 
politicians spoke out publicly as well as privately against capital punishment 
in their dealings with other governments. Such public statements have been 
quite rare, except where those facing execution are Australian citizens. In 
addition to "quiet" diplomacy, the government needs a principled, consistent, 
and more vocal opposition to the death penalty, whether or not the lives at 
stake are Australian.

China reportedly continues to execute people in alarming numbers. Indonesia, 
India, and Pakistan all recently resumed executions, so it seems the death 
penalty is making a resurgence in Australia's neighborhood.

Human Rights Watch, which opposes the death penalty in all circumstances, urges 
Australia to be a leader in a global effort to reject the death penalty, 
especially across the Asia-Pacific region. Australia could assist in educating 
the region's populations on how the death penalty has failed to deter crime and 
been unjustly applied, and help gradually build pressure against the practice.

These are universal values, not Australian values. The UN General Assembly has 
passed resolutions year after year calling on countries to suspend use of the 
death penalty with a view toward its abolition. UN Secretary-General Ban 
Ki-moon has said, "The death penalty has no place in the 21st century."

Australia should partner with the UN as well as abolitionist countries in the 
region including Cambodia, New Zealand, Philippines, and Timor Leste, targeting 
countries that continue to execute people - for instance, China, India, 
Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Vietnam - as well as countries such as Papua 
New Guinea and Brunei that have had moratoriums in place, but which are taking 
steps to reintroduce the death penalty. Australia should also not shy away from 
raising these issues with countries that frequently carry out executions, 
notably the United States, Iran, and Saudi Arabia.

For Australia's voice to carry more weight against judicial executions, it is 
important that Australia publicly registers its opposition to death sentences 
wherever and whenever possible. People across Asia also need to be mobilized. 
Reaching out to and building support among Asians and Pacific Islanders could 
help to end this cruel and inhumane punishment once and for all.

In expanding its policy on the death penalty abroad, the government should 
consider the British government's strategy, which entails a comprehensive 
public agenda for it to push for its abolition.[1] The strategy paper includes 
clear benchmarks and goals to guide British embassies in advocating against the 
death penalty in countries in which executions continue. In addition to public 
and private pressure on individual cases, the strategy also includes support 
for civil society groups to raise awareness, and for lawyers to bring legal 
challenges. Britain credits successes in Barbados, Uganda, and Kenya, which 
have each taken steps to reduce the use of executions, as examples of its 
impact.

Below is a list of recommendations for consideration.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) should:

1. Issue a public strategy document on the death penalty with clear and 
specific goals per country retaining the death penalty, and advise Australian 
diplomats and embassy staff on making death penalty issues a priority. DFAT 
should report publicly on progress in an annual report on countries retaining 
the death penalty. The US government issues annual human rights country 
reports, yet due to its own continued use of capital punishment, its reporting 
on its use is inadequate. Such a public report would be a valuable contribution 
to the worldwide movement against the death penalty.

2. Publicly as well as privately urge governments that retain the death penalty 
to work toward a full ban. Direct ambassadors to find opportunities to advocate 
regularly and publicly against the death penalty so that Australia's position 
is well-known rather than waiting until Australian lives are at stake.

3. Work with the UN and like-minded countries to issue statements of concern 
where executions are handed down or carried out.

4. Work toward absolute abolition, but in countries where that is an 
unrealistic short-term goal, try to reduce use of the death penalty through 
other means, including by calling for a reduction of crimes punishable by death 
- namely the most serious and violent crimes.

For instance, in countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Pakistan, many 
non-violent crimes are punishable by death. In Iran, "insulting the Prophet," 
apostasy, same-sex relations, adultery, and drug-related offenses can carry the 
death penalty. Pakistan's penal code makes the death penalty mandatory for 
blasphemy, and 17 people convicted of blasphemy are currently on death row.

Consensual same-sex relations may be punishable by death in Iran, Nigeria, 
Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen.[2] In Iran, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, 
Sudan, and Yemen, and in parts of Nigeria and Somalia, the death penalty may be 
applied in cases of consensual homosexual conduct.

According to Saudi Interior Ministry statements, Saudi Arabia executed 135 
persons between January and September 2015, and 58 of those executed were 
convicted for non-violent drug crimes.

Both Vietnam and China have recently reduced the number of crimes punishable by 
death, though in both cases some crimes remain that are non-violent. India's 
Law Commission recommended the government keep the death penalty only for 
terrorism-related crimes. The Malaysian government is reviewing the mandatory 
imposition of its death penalty for drug offenses. Moving away from mandatory 
application of the death penalty for drug offences is an area where Australia 
could help build some momentum.

5. Press countries, such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, China, and Vietnam, to remove 
the death penalty from national security crimes like "terrorism" that are 
ill-defined or that could include peaceful acts of criticism against the state. 
Egypt's legal definition of "terrorism" is so broadly worded as to encompass 
civil disobedience. In Iran, people have been sentenced to death on account of 
alleged ties to armed opposition groups. According to a study by Justice 
Project Pakistan, of the 6,872 prisoners on death row in Pakistan in 2012 (now 
over 8,000), 818 were tried on terrorism-related charges. Pakistan's definition 
of terrorism is so vague that many crimes can fall under this definition.

6. Give priority to advocacy in countries where there are concerns about fair 
trials and due process, especially in countries that use torture to extract 
confessions. Australia should monitor such trials and speak out publicly 
against abuses of due process, such as in China, Egypt, India, Iran, and 
Vietnam. In China, death penalty sentences have been handed down to alleged 
"terrorists" blamed for violent attacks. But there is gross disregard of the 
most basic aspects of a fair trial, including access to counsel and freedom 
from ill-treatment in detention, highlighted by China's checkered record of 
torture in police interrogation.[3]

In Egypt, mass trials have resulted in death penalties handed down to hundreds 
of suspects for politically motivated reasons and based almost entirely on the 
unsubstantiated testimony of security officials.

In Pakistan, the anti-terrorism courts that have sentenced people to death on 
terrorism charges raise serious due process concerns by holding trials in 
absentia or often using statements obtained through torture as evidence.

Bangladesh continues to use the death penalty, including in war crimes 
tribunals for those charged with serious crimes during the war for 
independence, in proceedings that fall far short of international fair trial 
standards.

7. Give priority to countries where children can be sentenced to death. In 
Egypt, Iran, Maldives, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, and Yemen, 
child offenders remain on death row.[4]

8. Advocate against civilians being tried in military courts empowered to hand 
down the death penalty, as in Egypt, Indonesia, Pakistan, and the United 
States.

9. React immediately and forcefully when countries move to lift official or 
unofficial death penalty moratoriums. For instance, Pakistan lifted a 
moratorium on executions on December 17, 2014, following an attack on a public 
school in Peshawar, and many executions rapidly followed.

10. Urge governments to publicize statistics regarding use of the death 
penalty. At present, in countries such as China and Vietnam, such information 
is secret. Without such information, it is impossible to evaluate claims of 
progress regarding reductions in use of the death penalty.

11. Work with governments in Asia-Pacific countries whose citizens are on death 
row abroad, such as Indonesia, and help these countries to advocate for the 
lives of their citizens, especially where they lack representation.

12. Where Australia is providing development assistance for criminal justice 
reform, benchmark that assistance against developments in reducing application 
of capital punishment and ensure that assistance is geared toward enhancing 
defense and due process rather than simply aiding prosecutions.

13. Support independent studies on the effectiveness of the death penalty in 
the Asia-Pacific region as a deterrent to crime, and examine arbitrary and 
discriminatory applications of the death penalty.

14. Enhance local efforts to end or reduce the death penalty by supporting 
civil society initiatives, lawyers groups, and others working to end the death 
penalty.

15. Support legal groups representing individuals on death row and working to 
bring legal and constitutional challenges against the death penalty.

16. Advocate on behalf of journalists, lawyers, and activists harassed, 
sanctioned, or imprisoned for raising death penalty cases. In some countries, 
such as China, activists may be punished for raising death penalty concerns.

17. Provide support, including the sharing of best practices, to help prisoners 
on death row get adequate mental health care.

18. Include death penalty issues in briefings on human rights for trade 
delegations and other groups traveling abroad for official visits.

19. Promote the repeal of the death penalty abroad at the applicable state or 
provincial level as well as with the national government. This includes raising 
concerns with visiting officials, such as from US states that retain the death 
penalty.

20. Consider measures to ensure no Australian products are used in 
administering the death penalty abroad. For instance, Australia could adopt the 
European Union approach by restricting exports of drugs for use in lethal 
injections.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] Foreign & Commonwealth Office, "Chapter V: Criminal Justice and the Rule of 
Law," in Human Rights and Democracy Report 2014, March 12, 2015, 
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/human-rights-and-democracy-report-2014/human-rights-and-democracy-report-2014#chapter-v-criminal-justice-and-the-rule-of-law 
(accessed October 1, 2015).

[2] "Iran: Discrimination and Violence Against Sexual Minorities," Human Rights 
Watch news release, December 15, 2010, 
https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/12/15/iran-discrimination-and-violence-against-sexual-minorities.

[3] "UN Human Rights Council: Egypt's Human Rights Situation; Repression in 
China; and Arrests in Bahrain," Human Rights Watch statement, September 17, 
2014, 
https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/09/17/un-human-rights-council-egypts-human-rights-situation-repression-china-and-arrests.

[4] Michael Garcia Bochenek, "Executions Down, But Not For Juvenile Offenders," 
Human Rights Watch dispatch, April 1, 2015, 
http://www.hrw.org/news/2015/04/01/dispatches-executions-down-not-juvenile-offenders.

(source: Human Rights Watch)


THAILAND:

Evidence doubt in Britons murder trial


Zaw Lin and Win Zaw Tun are accused of the murder of 24-year-old David Miller 
and the rape and murder of Hannah Witheridge, 23, on southern Koh Tao island in 
September 2014.

Both men have pleaded not guilty and face the death penalty if convicted over a 
case which tarnished Thailand's reputation as a tourist paradise and has seen 
the police accused of bungling the investigation.

A verdict is expected on Christmas Eve.

Prosecutors insist their case against the men is watertight and includes DNA 
found on Witheridge's body and around the crime scene.

But the defence has raised doubts over the forensic evidence, bringing in an 
expert witness who said the murder weapon - a garden hoe - did not carry the 
DNA of the accused.

The defence delivered their closing statement on Monday, the culmination of a 
21-day trial stretched out over more than 3 months that has heard harrowing 
details of the gruesome murders.

The forensic testimony against the accused is "unreliable and... inadmissible," 
the statement released to the media said, adding "the prosecution's case is 
marked by an absence of significant evidence" to prove guilt.

Questioning the integrity of the murder probe, the defence said the 2 migrant 
workers were "questioned without lawyers" and made to sign documents that they 
did not understand.

Confessions made soon after their arrest were later retracted as they were 
given under duress, it added.

Lead defence lawyer Nakhon Chompuchat said his clients hoped "common sense" 
would prevail and see them acquitted.

The battered bodies of the British holidaymakers were found on the sleepy 
diving island of Koh Tao on September 15, 2014.

Police say Miller was struck by a single blow and left to drown in shallow surf 
while Witheridge had been raped and then beaten to death with a garden hoe.

Family members of both victims have attended parts of the trial, often breaking 
down during the more harrowing moments.

It is not clear whether they will be present for the verdict on December 24.

Christmas is not a public holiday in Thailand.

(source: Iolmobile news)






IRAN:

4 juveniles sentenced to death


A report obtained from Sanandaj Prison, in the provincial capital of Iranian 
Kurdistan, western Iran, shows that 4 prisoners who were detained while under 
the age of 18 have been sentenced to death.

According to this report, the prisoners are:

Youssef Mohammadi, 20. Arrested at age: 14

Himan Ourami-nejad, 18. Arrested at age: 17

Amanj Hosseini. Arrested at age: 17

Siavosh Mahmoudi, 20. Arrested at age: 17. He has said he committed a murder in 
self-defense against rape.

2 weeks ago the Iranian regime hanged Fatemeh Salbehi, 23, and Samad Zahabi, 
who were both 17 at the time of their alleged crime.

The UN Special Rapporteur on summary executions, Cristof Heyns, described these 
2 executions as "unlawful killings committed by the State, the equivalent of 
murders performed by individuals."

In his report to the United Nations General Assembly on September 25, UN 
Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that "there were reportedly 160 juveniles at 
risk of execution and at least 13 juvenile offenders were reportedly executed 
in 2014" in Iran.

Implementation of these sentences by the Iranian regime violates Iran's 
commitments in the framework the International Covenant on Civil and Political 
Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which prohibit the death 
penalty for anyone under the age of 18.

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

Call to save lives of 4 prisoners who were juvenile offenders


The Iranian regime as the foremost executioner of children in the world 
sentenced to death 4 young prisoners in Sanandaj Prison who were juveniles at 
the time of their crimes. The Iranian Resistance calls on all international 
human rights agencies, especially the UN Secretary-General, the High 
Commissioner for Human Rights, and pertinent UN Rapporteurs, as well as the 
European Union and the U.S. government, to take immediate action to obstruct 
these cruel executions that contravene many international laws and covenants.

Yousef Mohammadi, 20, and Heeman Orami-nejad, 18, were both 14 years old when 
they committed their crimes and are now sentenced to death. Siavosh Mahmoudi 
and Amanej Hosseini (Oveissi) who were arrested when 17 are also at the risk of 
being hanged. Another young prisoner by the name of Kiomars Nasseiri, also a 
prisoner in Sanandaj Prison who was arrested when a juvenile, is threatened to 
be sentenced to death.

Amnesty International said the executions of 2 prisoners (Fatemeh Salbehi and 
Samad Zahabi) who were under 18 years of age at the time of committing the 
crimes "make a mockery of juvenile justice." AI added, "The use of the death 
penalty is cruel, and inhumane and degrading in any circumstances, but it is 
utterly sickening when meted out as a punishment for a crime committed by a 
person who was under 18 years of age."

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon also expressed "deep sadness" on October 19, 
2015, at the execution of 2 juvenile prisoners by the Iranian regime. The UNSG 
statement note, "Over 700 executions are reported to have taken place so far 
this year," calling it "the highest total recorded in the past 12 years". He 
called on the Iranian regime to establish a moratorium on executions with a 
view to abolishing the death penalty.

However, the Iranian regime that continuously ratchets up the catastrophic 
dimensions of suppression to create a climate of terror that especially targets 
the youth is unable to halt or even ease the waves of suppression, in 
particular the executions, in order to confront increasing protests and popular 
loath. In reaction to worldwide condemnation of egregious and systematic 
violation of human rights in Iran, head of regime's judiciary Sadeq Larijani 
announced: "We shall never retreat from the Sharia Law. The issue of Islamic 
values relates to the quality of governing of the countries and others have no 
right to intervene." This is despite the fact that the Iranian regime has 
endorsed international covenants such as the Convention on the Rights of the 
Child that bar execution of juveniles.

(source for both: NCR-Iran)

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

Remembering Reyhaneh Jabbari


On the anniversary of Reyhaneh Jabbari's execution by the Iranian government, 
it's important to remember her through her own words.

"With a hanging rope in front of my eyes, that I am not afraid of, I write to 
tell the tale that I lived, leaving nothing unspoken." - Reyhaneh Jabbari

Today is a cold anniversary marred by the reminder of an unjust death. On this 
day one year ago, Reyhaneh Jabbari was executed by hanging in Iran. She was 
only 26 years old at the time of her death. Despite the fact she was taken from 
this earth, she left us many important things before her departure. She willed 
us words that are eternally poetic, whether she intended them that way or not, 
whether she knew they would reach us or not.

The death of Reyhaneh Jabbari is more than just an unfortunate event. She is 
more than the horror that led up to her untimely demise. She was a young woman 
full of things we needed to hear and it's a shame that the world was only 
allowed to read about her in the terrible outcome of her "trial" and the 
international disgust thereafter. It's important for us all to realize that her 
execution, the injustice around it and the chauvinism hurled at her are not 
just Iranian problems.

Reyhaneh was convicted of killing a man she said attempted to rape her. She was 
arrested in 2007 after being accused of the murder of Morteza Abdolali 
Sarbandi, a former Iranian intelligence ministry worker. She wrote from prison 
about how she was forced to confess to premeditated murder:

Once they took me somewhere for interrogation where I saw a 14 or 15 year old 
girl hanging from the ceiling from her wrists. The girl was pale, her lips were 
cracked. She was whimpering.

[In another room,] the interrogator sat across from me and said that today or 
tomorrow they would go get my little sister ... He referred to her by name: 
Badook. "It is her turn," he said. "She is frail, thin ... How long do you 
think she will last hanging like that one?" He began telling me in detail what 
he was going to do in front of me to my little sister ... I started crying and 
begged him not to do such a thing. He said he had no alternative. I asked him 
what I could do to stop him from hurting my sister. He said: "It is very 
simple. Just confess that you bought the knife before the murder." ... So I 
wrote that I had bought the knife beforehand, signed the paper and breathed a 
sigh of relief.

She would spend years in prison awaiting her execution. I imbibed whatever 
words I could find from her after reading about her story and came to see her 
extremely moving heart in the expressions rendered from the captivity of 
imprisonment. The late Jabbari was a woman who like many other women became 
prey for the deviant intentions of men.

In Mexico, a case with some parallels took place with Yakiri Rubi Rubio. 
According to Yakiri, on December 9, 2013, she was abducted by two brothers who 
took her back to a hotel at knifepoint where they sexually abused her. She was 
ultimately able to use the weapon against her assailants and escape. Although 
she was not executed for defending herself, it was 18 months later after she'd 
spent time in prison that courts would concede she was defending herself.

Iran's regional rival, Saudi Arabia, sentenced a woman to 6 months in prison 
and 200 lashes for her gang rape around the same time Reyhaneh was arrested. 
Her punishment increased when she spoke to the media about what happened to 
her. She would ultimately be pardoned though she too faced prison time for her 
rape.

The state and its executioners often back up and reinforce the men who 
victimize rather than the women who have been victimized.

Women's punishment and death for rape and sexual abuse are not new phenomena. 
Europe and the United States both have rich histories in this regard. From the 
kidnapping and rape of enslaved African and Native women to the witch trials 
that took place throughout, criminalizing women at any expense was normalized 
as foundational early on in the formation of the nation-states we recognize 
today.

An early example lies in the case of a 19-year-old enslaved woman named Celia. 
After years of being raped by her "owner," Robert Newsom, she eventually became 
unwilling to take any more of his abuse. One night after Newsom informed Celia 
he would be paying her a visit she clubbed him to death upon arrival to her 
cabin. She faced trial over his murder and was hung at the gallows, like 
Reyhaneh, for killing the man who regularly violated her. Death makes permanent 
the solution then and now for many women who dare to challenge the desire of 
their male attackers.

The state and its executioners often back up and reinforce the men who 
victimize rather than the women who have been victimized. Reyhaneh's case is 
one more example of the futility of the death penalty.

I can never hope to completely understand the struggle or the women who have 
been taken away by the endless vortex of sexist accusation and punishment. For 
centuries, dating back to the most ancient of times, this spectacle has been 
repeated. Another young star was destroyed before she could actualize her hopes 
and her dreams. Reyhaneh told us as much when she wrote:

Anytime I think of my hopes and dreams, I start to cry. When I fall asleep 
thinking of the hopes I had for my future, I dream of myself on my wedding day 
wearing a white dress. Then slowly the dress turns from white to black, my eye 
makeup looks like I have been crying, my face is covered with black tulle and I 
see myself holding a bouquet of dried up dead flowers. I have never told a soul 
about this until now. No one knows how I was forced to give up the love of my 
life. I had to. When I was nineteen I had no idea that my life would go up in 
smoke in that house and that a few years later, the courts would decide to make 
me into ashes.

These institutions that snatched Reyhaneh are grossly repetitive: misogyny, 
execution and government. The way they worked in harmony to stifle her voice is 
an evil harmony in a sad song that plays on repeat the world over. Be it where 
I live in the United States or in Iran, each of these systems has the complete 
and full capability of committing more trauma on top of what already preexists. 
There is no reconciliation in the needles that inject poison, the ropes that 
squeeze necks or any of the methods governments use to kill those they have 
deemed unfit to live.

The irony lies in the fact that the ones who choose to take life see themselves 
as holy and in situations like Reyhaneh's, governments spite their adversaries 
by condemning them for killing women and men like her. Meanwhile, they all do 
the same to their own citizens. Reyhaneh was not a tool for jingoists to label 
Iran as primitive. She was a person who had her own life, her own desires and 
her own words. She was special and unique in the softness of her existence.

The reality that permanently stripped her of her physical consciousness was 
like a bullet piercing a cloud. Despite the fact she is gone and I'll never see 
her face, or read new words from her, she is still here. She will come and 
reform again and again like water that evaporates and falls from the sky and 
separates to go off distances. She is living because she chose to live through 
her final experience and surpass the boundaries of physical death.

In her final words to her mother, she said:

My kind mother, dear Sholeh, the one more dear to me than my life, I don't want 
to rot under the soil. I don't want my eye or my young heart to turn into dust 
... Beg so that it is arranged that as soon as I am hanged my heart, kidney, 
eye, bones and anything that can be transplanted be taken away from my body and 
given to someone who needs them as a gift. I don't want the recipient to know 
my name, buy me a bouquet, or even pray for me. I am telling you from the 
bottom of my heart that I don't want to have a grave for you to come and mourn 
there and suffer. I don't want you to wear black clothing for me. Do your best 
to forget my difficult days. Give me to the wind to take away.

Reyhaneh has certainly given us her heart and spilled its beauty for us to 
carry it with us wherever we should go. In her words, she gave us bones to make 
us strong and kidneys to cleanse us of the toxins of this world. And lastly she 
gave us eyes to see if we will only look through them.

(source: Op-Ed, William C. Anderson; truth-out.org)






INDONESIA:

Indonesian police arrest former Indian teacher wanted in murders of 20 women

Police on the Indonesian resort island of Bali say they've arrested a former 
Indian primary school teacher who is facing the death penalty in his homeland 
for the murders of 20 young women.

Mohan Kumar is accused of murdering the women using cyanide from 2003 to 2009. 
A court in the southern Indian city of Mangalore sentenced him to death in 
December 2013.

Denpasar Police chief detective Reinhard Habonaran Nainggolan says Kumar was 
arrested Sunday after arriving at Bali's airport from Sydney, based on a red 
notice from Interpol.

Nainggolan said police were questioning Kumar on Monday and coordinating with 
Indian diplomats.

Media in India have reported that Kumar, known as Cyanide Mohan, is a serial 
killer who preyed on women looking for marriage.

(source: Associated Press)