[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Nov. 8



LEBANON:

Death penalty requested for failed bombers


A judge requested the death penalty Friday for 2 alleged would-be suicide 
bombers, a Frenchman and a Saudi, and for 3 Lebanese suspects accused of being 
part an ISIS-affiliated group behind suicide-bomb plots in Beirut.

In his indictment, Judge Riad Abu Ghayda requested the death penalty for French 
national Fayez Boushran, Saudi Abdel-Rahman Naser al-Shenefi, and three 
Lebanese nationals identified as Alaa Kanaan, Ayman Kanaan and Mahmoud Khaled.

The judge also sought a sentence of 15 years in prison with hard labor for 2 
other Lebanese nationals.

The men, all of whom have been detained, were part of a 10-member group, known 
as "the hotels cell," and were affiliated with ISIS. Their aim was to carry out 
suicide attacks in Beirut and its southern suburbs in revenge for "Hezbollah's 
alleged killing of Sunnis in Syria," a judicial source told The Daily Star.

The plot was broken up in a series of raids last June.

In the indictment, Abu Ghayda said the cell had had 3 separate tasks. The 1st 
was assigned to the Frenchman, who had joined ISIS' ranks to carry out jihad 
against Shiites "to teach them a lesson for fighting in Syria."

The Frenchman was chosen to carry out a suicide attack in Beirut. Upon his 
arrival in Lebanon, Boushran met with Munzer al-Hasan, who recruited suicide 
bombers. Hasan was killed during an Army raid to arrest him weeks after the 
arrest of the French national.

Hasan transported Boushran to the Napoleon Hotel in the Beirut neighborhood of 
Hamra and gave him pocket money. Boushran was instructed to remain at the hotel 
until someone contacted him about the target of the attack, which was to take 
place in Beirut's southern suburbs, a Shiite-dominated area.

Boushran was arrested at the hotel on June 20 during a raid by the Internal 
Security Forces' Information Branch.

The 2nd task was assigned to 2 Saudi men including Shenefi, who was wounded 
when his partner, Ali al-Thuwayne, blew himself up on June 25 during a General 
Security raid on the Duroy Hotel, in the Beirut neighborhood of Raouche, where 
they were staying.

Shenefi and Thuwayne had planned to blow themselves up at the Al-Saha 
restaurant in the capital's southern suburbs. 1 of the men was supposed to 
carry out the 1st suicide attack during a World Cup match, while hundreds were 
gathered to watch. Seconds later, the other was to blow himself up as people 
rushed to help the wounded, to kill as many victims as possible.

The Saudi men also met Hasan upon their arrival to Lebanon, and the recruiter 
showed them the location of the restaurant on their way from the airport to 
their hotel.

The 3rd mission was assigned to Hasan's group, which prepared explosive belts 
and bombs for the would-be suicide bombers.

The men were transferred to the Military Tribunal for trial.

Abu Ghayda cleared seven people because of a lack of evidence.

(source: The Daily Star)






PAKISTAN:

What Will Happen to Aasia Bibi?


On October 23, 2014, Aasia Bibi - the most prominent blasphemy case 
death-sentence prisoner in the history of one of Pakistan's most controversial 
laws - had her appeal for retraction of her punishment met with rejection at 
the Lahore High Court. Her lawyers will move the appeal to the Supreme Court, 
which seems like an exercise in futility since the Court's backlog of cases 
will not allow the hearing of this controversial (read: unimportant) case until 
2017. And Aasia Bibi, languishing in jail on a case full of holes, will go on 
suffering one endless day at a time, dying inwardly, while waiting, silently, 
without hope, for that final moment when she would become the 1st woman in the 
history of Pakistan to be hanged for "desecration" of the faith Pakistan was 
created to "safeguard." Ostensibly.

Human rights organizations in Pakistan and globally have erupted in outrage 
vis-a-vis the upholding of Aasia Bibi's death sentence. A case that had Pope 
Benedict XVI appeal to then Pakistan government for clemency has unleashed the 
Pandora's box of how one law in a Muslim state has been misused not just to 
persecute its dangerously dwindled minorities, but also many from its main 
religion: Islam. The word "minorities" is abhorrent to me, but I'm forced to 
use it for purposes of simplification for all who are unfortunate to be 
citizens of a country that has convoluted into such a bigoted, fanatic 
"fortress" of the faith of its almost 96% population that many of those who are 
not Muslim wish they were anywhere but here. I read the reports of 
international groups and activists who expressing anger and dismay at Aasia 
Bibi's appeal-rejection intend to put pressure on Pakistan government to 
overturn the sentence. I also read statements of many Christian groups in 
Pakistan whose years' long fights to have Aasia Bibi's unjust sentence revoked 
in a court of law remain fruitless. I, as a practicing Muslim, hear these very 
brave, very resilient voices echo in a well, cyclically, in the asphyxiating, 
verging-on-blind bigotry of the confines of that hallowed institution called 
the court of law in a Muslim country called Pakistan.

What is the real issue here? The alleged desecration of the religion of the 
majority? Or the blatant desecration of the religion of the "minorities"? Since 
Allah decrees clearly in the Quran, "There is no compulsion in religion" 
(2:256), what is it that the adherents of one of Allah's religions are 
attempting to establish here? The obeisance to faith by the blade of a sword is 
neither sanctioned nor viable in the world that reverberates of many beliefs 
and multiple narratives. Acceptance and respect come from within, from the 
soul, and no amount of forced declarations would prove to be sufficient to 
establish the superiority of one faith over the other. The divides are becoming 
wider with the lines delineated in blood, and the blood congealing in distorted 
shapes only to await more persecuted bodies thrown in the circle without any 
armor of protection.

Blasphemy law, created in 1927 by the British in then united Pakistan, India 
and Bangladesh, was a penal code for "deliberate and malicious acts intended to 
outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religious belief." The 
law emphasized that there would no discrimination in religions, and it would be 
applicable to all. After General Ziaul Haq, the military dictator who ruled 
Pakistan from 1977 to 1988, made multiple additions to the blasphemy law, which 
included life imprisonment for the defiling or desecrating of the Holy Quran. 
In 1986, the death penalty was the harshest addition to the law for anyone 
found guilty of desecration or defaming of Islam.

Since then, although no death sentence has been carried out in a blasphemy 
case, there have been more than 4,000 cases (since 1927), and many lives have 
been ruined. Without even elaborating the importance of tenets of forgiveness 
and mercy of a religion of whose holy book has 113 of its 114 surahs begin with 
"In the name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful, the legality of 
a penal code is a discussion that merits its own space. Settling of scores, 
elimination of personal rivals, persecution of weaker individuals and groups, 
terrorizing the population... name it, and you would find the application of 
blasphemy law to camouflage a nefarious motive. That is the most blatant 
distortion of a law created to safeguard religious sensibilities that does not 
find much credence or even mention anywhere in a highly fragile balance of what 
goes for personal, legal and religious domains of lives in Pakistan today.

The story of Aasia Bibi is not about disrespect of Islam. The story of Aasia 
Bibi is that of the persecution of a Christian woman by the allegation of that 
one thing that is unbearable to Muslims: desecration of their Prophet Mohammad 
(PBUH). To me, and all Muslims, there is no person more important, more sacred 
than our Prophet (PBUH). And to me, any disrespect shown to him is a matter of 
great personal distress. The acceptance and respect of all prophets mentioned 
in the Quran, and even the non-Abrahamic religions is ingrained in my 
consciousness, and the plurality of faiths is something I acknowledge as a part 
of my mortal existence. And in my entire life - except for myriad, very 
unpleasant, experiences on Twitter, I have never encountered a single instance 
of disrespect to my faith, its tenets, and most importantly, to its Messenger 
from any person who does not share my faith. I grew up with Christians as my 
neighbors and friends; I studied with many, and I interacted with countless. 
And to date, I am unable to think of a singular derogatory word from anyone of 
those around me about Islam and its icons. Any Muslim that I ask - of any age, 
belief and background -- has the same testimonial about the people of other 
faiths they have interacted with, personally and otherwise. Therefore, the idea 
of a poor, Christian woman rotting in jail for years is a matter of great 
concern to me. To me it is very simple because I believe justice is not just 
delayed in her case, but is blind due to fear of bigoted backlash. As per Aasia 
Bibi's lawyers, most of her fellow villagers, and some well-known political and 
feudal names - people unrelated to the case - who hail from Nankana (her 
hometown), the story is about a fight between a poor woman and some people who 
had a problem with the mere existence of people of her faith. The fight was 
turned into a non-discussable issue once the word "blasphemy" was thrown in. 
The hearsay became words etched in stone. Testimonies of unreliable so-called 
witnesses became irrefutable facts. Altered statements of the prosecuting side 
become the last word in reliable evidence. And the system of appeal becomes 
convoluted before the request was even read. This is a case where the accused 
was declared guilty before the trial even reached a court, and the trial in 
court merely ended up becoming a repetition of the trial outside the court.

I don't write to have my outrage quoted in some international publication. I 
don't write to have my article Favorited/Retweeted by those who live in other 
countries or practice other faiths. I don't write to be praised for my 
"bravery" to speak up about a "taboo" subject. The SOLE reason why I write 
about Aasia Bibi is because to me she is that one more person who has been 
jailed for being: a) poor b) a woman c) Christian, and d) a poor, Christian, 
woman who dared to fight with those who claim to have the copyright to morality 
- ethical and religious: Muslims. As Aasia Bibi spends most of her time in 
solitary confinement (since June 2009), her children and husband, forced to 
move five times, hiding their identities in fear of persecution, the big 
questions remain unanswered. As expected.

How did the Blasphemy Law, which as per many leading Islamic scholars including 
Dr Javed Ghamidi, has no basis in the Quran, and which came into existence 
because of the "divide-and-rule" wiles of the imperialistic British in the 
Subcontinent, have become a "forbidden" topic in Pakistan? How has the 
Blasphemy Law become that one subject whose very mention makes you a pariah in 
society, in media? How has a man-made law been exploited to enforce respect of 
a divine religion and its icons? How has the law been used to settle scores, 
persecute the "undesirables" of all faiths (including Islam) without any fear 
of reprisal? How did the flaky testimony of 2 Muslim women who started the 
fight, insulted Aasia Bibi's faith (blasphemous as per Section 295-A & 298 of 
the Blasphemy Law), and called her "untouchable," made Aasia Bibi worthy of a 
death sentence while those 2 "pious" women remained free of any reprimand? How 
did the demeaning of one of Allah's most revered prophets, Jesus-Isa (PBUH) 
become so inconsequential that no one even mentioned it? And how in the world, 
a case based on hearsay, on words - NOT anything that involved blasphemous acts 
insulting Islam or spreading hatred against it - uttered in a personal fight - 
became a legal - forget about religious and ethical grounds here - 
justification for sentencing a poor, Christian woman to death?

(source: Mehr Tarar; Writer, blogger; former op-ed editor of the Daily Times, 
Pakistan----Huffington Post)






BANGLADESH:

Execution only thru' due process


2 human rights experts of the United Nations have called on the government to 
stay the execution of Jamaat-e-Islami leader Muhammad Kamaruzzaman who has been 
awarded death penalty for crimes against humanity during the Liberation War.

Christof Heyns, the UN special rapporteur on summary executions, and Gabriela 
Knaul, another UN special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, 
said a person sentenced to death must have the right to seek pardon or 
commutation of his sentence.

In a press release on November 6, Heyns and Knaul noted: "In countries that 
have not abolished the death penalty, capital punishment may be imposed only 
following a trial that complied with the most stringent guarantees of fair 
trial and due process.

"Any death sentence executed in contravention of a government's international 
obligations is tantamount to an arbitrary execution."

Last year, the 2 UN human rights experts had urged Bangladesh to halt the 
execution of Jamaat leader and convicted war criminal Abdul Quader Mollah.

On November 3, the Supreme Court upheld the death penalty for Jamaat's 
Assistant Secretary General Kamaruzzaman, a key organiser of infamous Al-Badr 
Bahini responsible for abducting, torturing and killing freedom fighters, 
intellectuals and pro-liberation people in 1971.

The government has already asked the Dhaka Central Jail authorities to make 
preparation for his execution.

However, a debate continues over Kamaruzzaman's right to seek review of the SC 
verdict.

The UN human rights specialists have on several occasions expressed concerns 
regarding serious violations of fair trial and due process guarantees in the 
judicial proceedings before the tribunal that were reported to them, the press 
release said.

LAW MINISTER'S REACTION

The government will not back off from executing the death sentence of 
Kamaruzzaman, Law Minister Anisul Huq told The Daily Star in his reaction to 
the UN human rights experts' call.

"The highest court of the country has sentenced Kamaruzzaman to death for his 
war-time crimes, maintaining all legal procedures. We are a sovereign nation, 
and therefore, the government will do the needful to implement the verdict," he 
said.

Anisul said as per the relevant rules, the Jamaat leader will be given seven 
days for seeking presidential mercy since his hearing of the judgment.

If Kamaruzzaman does not seek presidential clemency within the time, the 
government will take necessary steps for his execution on the basis of the SC's 
short verdict, the minister said.

Citing an example, Anisul said the so-called killers of late president Ziaur 
Rahman were hanged a few hours after the SC upheld their death sentences in 
1982.

The minister hoped to receive the short verdict from the SC on the Jamaat 
leader very soon.

About the UN human rights experts' request, Anisul said he would send their 
statement to the foreign ministry to find out its authenticity and would make a 
decision about it on receipt of the foreign ministry report.

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

'Kamaruzzaman's death sentence execution on SC verdict release'


Convicted war criminal Muhammad Kamaruzzaman's death sentence will be carried 
out on the release of the Supreme Court verdict, the law minister has said.

A copy of the SC judgment which may be short or full is needed for executing 
the death sentence, Anisul Huq told The Daily Star this evening.

After getting the certified copy of the SC judgment, International Crimes 
Tribunal-2 will issue a death warrant against Kamaruzzaman and then the jail 
authorities will carry out the sentence, the minister added.

Earlier in the day, Anisul told the media that the sentence will be executed if 
he does not seek presidential mercy in seven days since hearing the SC verdict 
that has upheld his death penalty on November 3.

"According to section 991 of the Jail Code, it is constitutionally obligatory 
that a condemned convict gets seven days to seek presidential mercy after he is 
informed about the verdict. And the time for seeking clemency (for 
Kamaruzzaman) is not over yet," Huq said while talking to reporters after 
emerging from a programme at Supreme Court auditorium.

Earlier on Wednesday, the minister told newsmen that if the Jamaat-e-Islami 
leader opts not to seek mercy in seven days after hearing the SC verdict, he 
would be hanged immediately.

The Supreme Court on Monday upheld the death penalty for Kamaruzzaman for 
committing crimes against humanity during the 1971 Liberation War.

Asked about the full text of the SC verdict, which has yet to reach Dhaka 
Central Jail where the death row convict has been kept now, the minister said: 
"There is nothing in Section 991 of the Jail Code that a condemned convict has 
to be informed about the verdict formally."

"We have to take steps based on the short verdict in this regard," he added.

"Soon after the verdict was announced, prison officials informed him 
(Kamaruzzaman) the judgement of the Appellate Division Court that upheld his 
death penalty," the minister said.

As reporters asked whether Kamaruzzaman will be hanged as the deadline is 
ending tomorrow, the minister said, "I don't know".

Now an assistant secretary general of Jamaat-e-Islami, he was a key organiser 
of the infamous Al-Badr Bahini responsible for abducting, torturing and killing 
freedom fighters, intellectuals and pro-liberation people during the 1971 
Liberation War.

In May last year, a war crimes tribunal sentenced him to death for war crimes.

(source for both: The Daily Star)



IRAN----executions

12 Executions inside Orumiyeh Central Prison in 11 Days; 9 of These for Drug 
Offenses


12 prisoners were hanged inside the Orumiyeh Central Prison between October 18 
and October 29, 9 of these for drug trafficking crimes, the International 
Campaign for Human Rights in Iran has learned.

According to a source, on October 18, 2014, 5 inmates sentenced to death on 
drug-related charges were transferred from the facility's Ward 15 to its 
Quarantine Ward, and hanged at 11:30 p.m. The 5 inmates, all citizens of 
Orumiyeh, were Fakhreddin Ghavidel, Esfandiar Ghahremani, Nejat Karimi, Arash 
Sigari, and Bahram Seddighi.

5 other inmates, Salaheddin Behnam Kerdar, Rashid Alizadeh, Reza Tahmassebi, 
Younes Golbahar, and Latif Mohammadi, were executed in the same facility on 
October 26, 2014. All of them, except for Mohammadi, had been sentenced to 
death on charges of drug trafficking and possession.

According to the United Nations, death sentences may be assigned only in the 
case of the "most serious" crimes, and drug-related charges do not fulfill this 
requirement. The vast majority of executions in Iran are carried out for 
drug-related offenses.

Recently, Iran's top human rights official, Mohammad Javad Larijani, stated in 
a CNN interview that 80% of the executions in Iran are drug-related and that 
the "world should appreciate" Iran's war on narcotics. The UN's Special 
Rapporteur on human rights in Iran, however, stated in his most recent report 
that "The rise in executions for crimes that do not meet the threshold of 
???most serious crimes'...severely contravene[s] the [Iranian] Government's 
international and national commitments."

Iran has the highest per capita execution rate in the world. According to the 
UN's Special Rapporteur on Iran, between July 2013 and June 2014, at least 852 
individuals were executed.

Another one of the executed individuals, Latif Mohammadi, was charged with 
murder and armed robbery. However, the victim's family subsequently forgave 
Mohammadi, and, under Iranian law, his Qisas (retaliatory death sentence) 
should have been either commuted or forgiven completely. Nevertheless, he 
remained on death row on the armed robbery charges and was executed along with 
the individuals convicted of drug crimes.

According to the source, on October 29, 2014, 2 other inmates, Ebrahim 
Choopani, a resident of Mahabad in Kurdistan Province arrested in 2009, and 
Yousef Hajiloo, a resident of Maku in West Azerbaijan Province arrested in 
2008, were also hanged inside the Orumiyeh Prison for Qisas on charges of 
murder.

The Campaign and United Nations experts have called for an immediate moratorium 
on executions in Iran as Iran's judicial process is characterized by an endemic 
lack of due process. Defendants are routinely denied access to counsel, forced 
under threat or torture to "confess," and then convicted, including in capital 
cases, after brief, unfair trials.

Additionally, news of these 12 executions has not been announced by any 
official Iranian news media, continuing a long-standing pattern of a lack of 
transparency regarding executions in Iran.

(source: Iran Human Rights)

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

11 Sunni prisoners at risk of imminent execution


11 Sunni prisoners were transferred to the Implementation of Sentences section 
in Rajai Shahr prison on 5 November 2014 and interrogated by prison officials, 
leading to concerns that the men could face execution soon.

According to the report of Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), the 11 
men, whose death sentences have been confirmed by the Supreme Court, had been 
sentenced to death after being convicted of 'Moharabeh [enmity against God] 
through the support of Salafi groups'.

The men, as well as their families, have repeatedly denied the charges, and say 
they were arrested and sentenced to death for spreading Sunni beliefs within 
the Shia-dominated Iran.

According to one of the transferred prisoners, who can not be named due to 
security reasons, the eleven men were questioned about topics including whether 
they were insured, if they had rented a house, how many family members they had 
provided for, whether they were married, and whether they had children.

Eyewitnesses reported that Mr Zare, the head of the section for the 
Implementation of Sentences, mockingly told the 11 men: "We want to know which 
of your families would be made the most miserable if we execute you."

Only 4 of the 11 transferred men have been identified: Hamed Ahmadi, Kamal 
Molayee, Jamshed Dehghani and Jahangir Dehghani.

(source: Human Rights Activsts News Agency)






KENYA:

Priest, 4 others found guilty of killing bishop

A Kenyan court has convicted 5 men, including a Catholic priest, for the murder 
of Bishop Luigi Locati in 2005.

Father Peter Guyo Wago Malley was found guilty of planning the killing of 
Bishop Locati, the apostolic vicar of Isiolo. The priest had reportedly 
quarreled with the bishop over an investigation into his financial affairs, and 
contracted with 4 Muslim men who staged an ambush shooting on July 14, 2005.

The 5 men all potentially face the death penalty, although no execution has 
been carried out in Kenya in the past 25 years. Defense lawyers say that they 
will appeal the guilty verdicts.

(source: Catholic Culture)