[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Sept. 30


GLOBAL:

Debate Table: From Iran to the U.S.


A steady stream of rain last Thursday did not prevent approximately 1,000 
protestors from crowding together on East 47th Street and Second Avenue to 
protest Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's appearance at the United Nations. 
Yellow umbrellas bobbed up and down between picket signs as the crowd chanted. 
A marching band played to energize the crowd in between speakers representing 
grassroots organizations, universities, and both Republican and Democratic 
parties.

Despite incessant rain, 1,000 people came out to protest President Rouhani's 
arrival at the UN. Protest organizers estimate that the anticipated crowd of 
4,000 was quelled by the storm.

The introductory speech was a message from Maryam Rajavi, President of the 
National Council of Resistance of Iran, a collation of 5 Iranian political 
opposition organizations in exile. She pinpointed the increase in capital 
punishment under Rouhani as a sign of growing human rights violations. UN 
monitors in Iran say that no less than 1,000 people have been executed during 
his 1st year in office, making Iran the country with the highest rate of 
executions per capita in the world. This ranking excludes China, whose death 
penalty data is a state secret but is estimated to total in the thousands, 
according to Amnesty International.

The protest was scheduled to coincide with Rouhani's speech this morning at the 
69th UN General Assembly but also overlapped with a high-level afternoon 
meeting led by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), 
entitled "Moving Away from the Death Penalty." Deputy Secretary-General Jan 
Eliasson asked nations to ratify a new UN protocol that would work toward the 
abolition of capital punishment worldwide. The event comes just after the 
release of an OHCHR report of the same name, which drew attention to 
discrimination- ethnic, economic and social- as a major problem in the 
application of the death penalty.

An installation of human cutouts with nooses around their necks represents the 
estimated executions of 1,000 Iranians in the last year of Rouhani's 
leadership.

While Iran is notorious for executions, the U.S. is also on the list of the 10 
countries with the highest number of executions each year. In 2012, there were 
3,033 people on death row, and 43 people were executed. Amnesty International 
released a report this year showing that in 2013, the US was the only country 
in the Americas with executions, 41 % of which took place in Texas.

When Ali Behrooziana, an Iranian writer now living in the U.S., was asked about 
the U.S. sharing the top 10 executors list with Iran, he said, "I don't think 
capital punishment here and executions in Iran are the same, but I do not agree 
with the death penalty for anybody. The US could be focusing instead on making 
better people from murderers."

Ali Amini, a refugee in the U.S. after fleeing Iran in 1996, added, "In the 
USA, it's done by the rule of law. In Iran, you are unjustly arrested and asked 
'do you support the regime?' If the answer is no, you are executed."

Shirin Nariman and I discussed her harrowing first-hand stories of experiencing 
executions while being held in a prison in Iran from 1981 to 1983.

Some of the protestors recounted first-hand experiences with execution. Shirin 
Nariman, an Iranian woman now living in exile in Virginia, spent 1981-83 in a 
prison for speaking out against the regime. She described her harrowing 
experience; "I was a senior in high school when I was taken. Every night, you 
would say goodbyes, knowing that 200-300 people would be executed by firing 
squad. Then hearing the sounds, you knew you were hearing your friends being 
killed."

Firing squad is still a method of execution in the U.S. as well. In 2012, 2 
inmates were shot by firing squad in Utah and Oklahoma and 3 were hung - in 
Delaware, New Hampshire and Washington, according to a report released last 
month by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics.

In November, the UN will vote on a resolution that requires all nations that 
maintain the death penalty to establish a moratorium on its use with a plan to 
move toward abolition. But, like all General Assembly resolutions, it would not 
be legally binding even if it passes.

(source: Huffington Post)






JAPAN:

The death penalty in Japan----Hanging tough


It is one of the anomalies of Japan's approach to the death penalty that a 
stricken conscience can bring the system grinding to a halt. At least 2 
Japanese justice ministers have refused to sign execution orders, most recently 
Seiken Sugiura, a devout Buddhist who oversaw a 15-month moratorium from 2005 
to 2006. But Japan's new justice minister, Midori Matsushima, seems unburdened 
by such doubts.

Ms Matsushima, who took office this month, has swatted away demands to review 
the system. Japan is one of 22 nations and the only developed country - apart 
from America, where it is falling out of favour - that retains capital 
punishment. "I don't think it deserves any immediate reform," she said last 
week: in her view the gallows are needed "to punish certain very serious 
crimes".

Calls for a review have grown since the release earlier this year of Iwao 
Hakamada, a 78-year-old who spent 45 years of his life in a toilet-sized cell 
awaiting execution. A Japanese court said the police evidence that put him 
behind bars in 1966 was probably fabricated. Mr Hakamada, dubbed the world's 
longest-serving death-row prisoner, is awaiting a fresh verdict later this 
year. Prosecutors have lodged an appeal against his retrial.

Opponents are hoping that the state's stubborn fight to wheel another elderly 
man back to the gallows (he is severely ill and suffers from advanced dementia) 
may trigger debate and a backlash. But critics face an uphill struggle. Japan's 
media largely steers clear of the topic. Ms Matsushima points to public support 
of over 85% on carefully-worded surveys put out by the cabinet: respondents 
reply to whether execution is "unavoidable if the circumstance demands it".

Mr Hakamada would not be the 1st elderly or infirm inmate to be hanged in 
Japan. On Christmas day in 2006, Fujinami Yoshio, aged 75, was brought to the 
gallows in the Tokyo Detention Centre in a wheelchair. Even the openly 
abolitionist Keiko Chiba, who was justice minister from 2009 to 2010, failed to 
make a dent in the system. In July 2010 she signed and attended 2 executions in 
a bid, she said, to start a public discussion that quickly petered out.

With the odds so highly stacked against them, some critics have tried to 
reframe the debate on the death penalty using soft power. For the last decade, 
a group of abolitionists has staged art exhibitions by death-row inmates, 
funded by a wealthy donor whose son is awaiting execution. Since the fund was 
set up a decade ago, 34 inmates have contributed hundreds of drawings, some of 
which are on display at a Tokyo gallery next month. 6 of the incarcerated 
artists have already been executed.

The fund's managers have announced, ahead of World Day Against the Death 
Penalty on October 10th, that they are extending it beyond the 10 years 
initially planned. They enlisted new donors after the death of the fund's 
original benefactor. Lamenting the latest double execution on August 29th, one 
of the managers told Kyodo News that the fund had "expected the death penalty 
to be abolished in Japan" within the decade of its activism. "But we cannot 
foresee abolition at present."

(source: The Economist)






SINGAPORE:

Govt Urged to Save Migrant Worker Facing Death Penalty in Singapore


An Indonesian woman working as a maid in Singapore will stand trial on Tuesday 
for the alleged murder of her employer.

Dewi Sukowati, 19, was arrested on March 19 following the death of Nancy Gan 
Wan Geok, a Singapore socialite who was found dead in her swimming pool. Gan 
died from a head injury.

The Indonesian embassy is providing support to Dewi, but advocates for the 
19-year-old - who is from Pati in Central Java - say she was a victim of human 
trafficking and more needs to be done to save her from a possible maximum 
sentence of death.

Imam Suroso, a member of Commission IX which oversees workers, health, 
population affairs and transmigration in the House of Representatives, is 
urging the Indonesian government to save Dewi. He has questioned the charges 
laid against her.

"It could be that she [Gan] died because she fell down and Dewi was there," he 
said.

Imam also said the agency that brought Dewi to Singapore should be on trial 
instead, because it used forged documentation.

According to Dewi's lawyer Muhammad Muzammil, who is head of the Semarang 
Indonesian Workers Protection and Placement Agency (BP3TKI), Dewi's age was 
faked. Muhammad was among a number of officials from the Ministry of Foreign 
Affairs who traveled to the woman's hometown to ascertain her real age. Despite 
initial media reports stating Deri was 23, she is 19.

Imam said Dewi's age was faked by the recruiter or sponsor to bring her to 
Singapore.

"Singapore law requires minimum age of 23 for maids to work legally," he said.

Indonesian law also requires citizens going abroad to work as maids to be at 
least 21 years old. The violation of both laws, Imam said, could be used 
against the recruiter.

"What the sponsor and agency have done amounts to human trafficking," he said.

Dewi's legal team has also interviewed Nurul Putri Mildanti, another former 
employee of the Gan family in Singapore. Nurul said Gan was harsh and violent 
when she worked for her.

(source: Jakarta Globe)

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

Appeals court upholds man's death sentence


A 39-year-old man who had been on death row for 5 years for knifing an elderly 
housewife more than 110 times in 2005 was yesterday denied the chance to escape 
the gallows.

Muhammad Kadar is the first convicted murderer to have his bid for 
re-sentencing rejected by the Court of Appeal since laws were changed last year 
giving judges the discretion to impose a life sentence instead of the death 
penalty for certain categories of murder.

Muhammad and his older brother Ismil first went on trial in 2006 for murdering 
their neighbour, Tham Weng Kuen, 69, at her Boon Lay flat while robbing her.

The long-running trial, which lasted three years, saw many twists and turns, 
including Muhammad's stunning confession in court that he was the sole 
assailant, although he had told police earlier that Mr Ismil was the main 
culprit.

Both were found guilty of murder by the High Court.

Their appeals against conviction ended in a dramatic twist in 2011 when Mr 
Ismil was freed after the Court of Appeal cleared him of murder.

Earlier this month, Muhammad applied to the High Court for his case to be sent 
back to the High Court for re-sentencing.

His lawyer, Amarick Gill, argued that the case fell within the category of 
murder with the intention of causing injury, which would ordinarily lead to 
death - and would have given him a chance to be re-sentenced to a life term.

But yesterday, the Court of Appeal dismissed Muhammad's bid, ruling that his 
crime amounted to murder with the intention to cause death, which still carries 
the mandatory death penalty.

Previous cases of convicted murderers who were re-sentenced to life 
imprisonment include that of Malaysian Fabian Adiu Edwin, who killed a security 
guard; Chinese national Wang Wenfeng, who killed a taxi driver; and Bangladeshi 
Kamrul Hasan Abdul Quddus, who killed his girlfriend.

(source: asiaone.com)

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

Hoping to graduate ---- Reprieved from the death penalty, Yong Vui Kong hopes 
to take up graduate studies in prison.


Yong Vui Kong, the Malaysian who received a reprieve on his death sentence for 
drug trafficking in Singapore is not content with merely escaping death.

His lawyer M. Ravi said that Yong wanted to take up studies in prison although 
that will be up to the discretion of the Changi prison.

"Singaporeans have the option to study in prison but in the case of foreigners 
it is up to the prison authorities," he told the Star Online.

Ravi said that Yong, 26, was willing to explore any opportunity to study but he 
believed that Yong was inclined towards languages as he was interested in 
English and Mandarin.

Ravi was however concerned about Yong's mental health as he was still confined 
to a solitary cell in prison.

"I am writing to the prisons about this. It has been almost a year that he was 
given the life in prison sentence," Ravi said adding that Yong looked very weak 
and had lost a lot of weight.

Yong, who is from Sabah, was initially sentenced to death in 2009 for 
trafficking 47gm of a controlled drug diamorphine in 2007. He was 18 when he 
was arrested.

In November last year however, the Singapore High Court re-sentenced Yong to 
life imprisonment and 15 strokes of the cane.

This came after the Singapore Government last year announced changes to the 
mandatory death penalty, allowing death row inmates to be given a lighter 
sentence if they met certain conditions.

If the Attorney-General finds that they meet these conditions, it will issue a 
Certificate of Co-operation (CoC) allowing the inmate to apply to the courts 
for the death sentence to be set aside and to be re-sentenced.

Yong was found to have met the conditions, which resulted in the High Court 
re-sentencing him.

Ravi has appealed against the caning sentence by challenging its 
constitutionality, but the Court of Appeal judgement is not out yet.

Since being imprisoned, Yong has turned over a new leaf, finding solace in his 
Buddhist faith and spending a lot of time on prayer and meditation. He has also 
become a vegetarian and taken a new name, Nan Di Li, from the Buddhist Dharma. 
He is believed to be a victim of circumstances, having dropped out of school 
when he was only 11, subsequently falling into bad company.

(source: The Star)






THAILAND:

Thai Man Gets Death Penalty for Train Rape, Murder


A former railway worker in Thailand was sentenced to death Tuesday for raping a 
13-year-old girl on an overnight train, then killing her and throwing her body 
out the window, an attack that sparked outrage in the Southeast Asian nation 
and prompted calls for the execution of rapists.

The case also raised questions about the safety of Thailand's long-distance 
trains, which are popular with tourists who visit the country's southern 
beaches and enjoy jungle treks in the north. As a result of the July attack, 
the State Railway of Thailand introduced special carriages for women and 
children for overnight trains on main routes.

The attacker, 22-year-old Wanchai Saengkhao, was a temporary train employee 
whose job it was to make beds in the sleeper cars. He confessed to drinking 
beer with his colleagues and taking drugs during his shift on the night of the 
attack and then raping the girl, who was sleeping in a lower bunk during a trip 
to Bangkok.

The Hua Hin provincial court on Tuesday convicted Wanchai of murder, raping a 
minor, concealing the body to hide the cause of death and other charges. It 
said Wanchai's crimes were "outrageous," "inhumane" and "could have an impact 
on society's order."

The girl was traveling with 2 of her sisters from their home in southern 
Thailand to the capital on their first solo train journey. When the sisters, 
ages 22 and 10, awoke in nearby beds, they found their 13-year-old sibling 
missing, and a nationwide manhunt began.

During a reenactment of the crime, Wanchai told police that he smothered the 
girl and then threw her body out of the moving train. Her naked body was found 
3 days after the murder in bushes alongside train tracks in western Thailand.

"The behavior in this case was serious and, therefore, deserves severe 
punishment," the judge said in the verdict.

Capital punishment is the maximum penalty for murder in Thailand, and rape is 
punishable by four to 20 years in prison.

The court also sentenced a 19-year-old train employee to 4 years in jail for 
aiding Wanchai with the rape.

Family members of the victim attended the ruling, wearing black shirts that 
called for capital punishment for rapists.

"Those who committed the crime must be punished for what they did. The court 
has given us justice," said Pattanachai Thaninpong, 35, a cousin of the victim.

The military junta that took power from a civilian government in a May 22 coup 
dismissed the governor of the State Railway of Thailand after the attack.

(source: Associated Press)


IRAN:

Execution of Reyhaneh Jabbari Postponed----Reyhaneh Jabbari's execution has 
been postponed and might be implemented at a later time. Iran Human Rights 
asked for continuation of the efforts to remove her death sentence.


Reyhaneh Jabbari's scheduled execution has been postponed for 10 days and she 
is transferred back to her old prison ward at Gharchak prison of Varamin 
(southern Tehran).

The death row prisoner Reyhaneh Jabbari was trnsferred yesterday (Monday 
September 29) to Rajaishahr prison of Karaj (West of Tehran) and the execution 
was scheduled for this morning. The news of her scheduled execution received 
broad attention inside and outside Iran. Tens of people had gathered outside 
Rajaishahr prison in protest to Reyhaneh's execution. Finally Reyhaneh's family 
were informed that the execution has been postponed for 10 days and Reyhaneh 
was subsequently transferred back to her old prison ward.

Another woman, identified as "Ashraf Nazari", was also scheduled to be executed 
this morning. At the present moment there is no information about her 
situation.

Iran Human Rights (IHR) emphasizes that Reyhaneh's execution has only been 
postponed and urged the international community and the civil society to 
continue their efforts until Reyhaneh's death sentence has been removed.

Background: Reyhaneh Jabbari, aged 26, was arrested in 2007 for the murder of 
Morteza Abdolali Sarbandi, a former employee of Iran's Ministry of 
Intelligence. Following her arrest, Reyhaneh Jabbari was held in solitary 
confinement for 2 months in Tehran's Evin Prison, where she did not have access 
to a lawyer or her family. Reyhaneh confessed that to the murder immediately 
after her arrest, though she did not have a lawyer present at the time she made 
her confession. She stated that the murder took place in self-defense.

Reyhaneh Jabbari was sentenced to death under qesas ("retribution-in-kind") by 
a criminal court in Tehran in 2009. The death sentence was upheld by the 
Supreme Court the same year.

(source: Iran Human Rights)

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

MEPs Call To Save Young Iranian Female Prisoner From Execution


Following information about the transfer of Ms Reyhaneh Jabbari to Gohardasht 
notorious prison for her execution, the Friends of a Free Iran in European 
Parliament issued an urgent press release calling for urgent action to save her 
life.

The release says: "According to reports received from inside Iran today, Ms 
Reyhaneh Jabbari, 26, a survivor of a sexual assault, is to be hanged 
imminently.

Reyhaneh Jabbari was sentenced to death in 2009 after a deeply flawed 
investigation and trial for having stabbed in self-defence an agent of Iran's 
notorious ministry of Intelligence, when he tried to sexually assault her."

FoFI's press release indicates that Ms Jabbari has been transferred to be 
hanged. Her mother said today that Reyhaneh had called her from Evin prison in 
the last minute before being transferred to Rajayi-Shahr prison for execution. 
The prison authorities said she would have to go and "collect the body" 
tomorrow.

"Amnesty International and many other international organisations have once 
again raised alarms today and called on Iran to halt this execution.

The Friends of a Free Iran in the European Parliament (FOFI) is outraged over 
the report of Reyhaneh Jabbari's imminent execution and the massive use of 
death penalty against the Iranian people under the so called moderate Rouhani.

"Last week, while the world powers were busy with nuclear talks with Iran in 
New York, Mohsen Amir-Aslani, 37, a prisoner of conscience was hanged in Iran 
for having made a different interpretation of the Quran.

Speaking from Brussels, Gerard Deprez, the chair of FOFI said "Hassan Rouhani's 
government has been hanging more than 1000 people, many of the in public 
squares in Iranian cities. This is the worst record by any Iranian president 
for the past 25 years."

The European Parliament informal group, referring to the talks between P5+1 and 
the Iranian regime warned, "If human rights are not improving in Iran, 
continued talks will only be seen as a green light for further aggression by 
the regime against its people as well as spreading its terror to other 
countries of the region."

"It is time the west imposes sanctions on Iran's human rights violations with 
no further delay."

Friends of a Free Iran (FoFI) is an informal group in the European Parliament 
which was formed in 2003 and enjoys the active support of many MEPs from 
various political groups.

(source: NCR-Iran)