[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Feb. 7


JAPAN:

Top court asks lay judges to exercise more fairness, prudence in sentencing



The death penalty is the ultimate punishment, for the life of the offender is 
the price paid to atone for a crime. The Supreme Court has called for caution 
and fairness in issuing death sentences. This judgment is understandable.

The top court has upheld separate rulings by the Tokyo High Court that 
overturned death sentences issued in lay judge trials at district courts for 
murder-robbery charges, and commuted the sentences to life imprisonment.

In each of the 2 cases, there was only 1 murder victim. In conventional trials 
involving only judges, there have been few cases in which a death sentence was 
issued after the murder was determined not to have been premeditated.

In upholding the high court decisions, the Supreme Court said, "Even in lay 
judge trials, deliberations on sentences must be conducted based on past 
judgments on punishment." This made it clear that the top court attaches weight 
to judicial precedents that have been accumulated over a long period of time.

In handing down a death sentence, the Chiba District Court placed great weight 
on the fact that the accused had repeatedly robbed and sexually assaulted women 
before and after he killed a female Chiba University student. In the other 
case, the Tokyo District Court issued a death sentence for killing a man in a 
robbery on the grounds that the accused had a previous criminal record having 
murdered his wife and child.

Regarding the Chiba case, the top court said the district court's decision "put 
too much emphasis on the antisocial personality of the accused." Concerning the 
Tokyo case, the top court said, "There is a tenuous relationship between the 
defendant's criminal record and the murder."

Convincing reasons vital

The top court also said, "In imposing capital punishment, it is necessary to 
present concrete and persuasive reasons." This means that such a perspective 
was absent in the death sentences determined by lay judge trials at the 
district courts.

The purpose of the lay judge system is to reflect the public's perspectives and 
societal values in court rulings. In its past decisions, the top court also 
presented the view that the judgments of lay judges must be respected.

Some have questioned the top court's decisions that overturned the judgments 
made by lay judges after long hours of painstaking deliberations.

But it must be noted that if the way death sentences are decided changes 
greatly from what was adopted conventionally, it will undermine fairness, which 
is the very basis of the judicial system.

In deliberating sentences, it is imperative for judges and lay judges to hold 
prudent discussions while taking past precedents into consideration.

Of course, there are cases when choosing the ultimate penalty is unavoidable. 
An example of this is the act of indiscriminate murder that occurred in 2008 on 
a street in Akihabara, Tokyo. 7 people were killed and 10 others were injured, 
some seriously.

The accused was indicted before the lay judge system was enforced in May 2009, 
so the trial at the Tokyo District Court was held only by professional judges. 
The Tokyo High Court and the Supreme Court upheld the district court's death 
sentence.

In handing down its ruling on the case on Feb. 2, the top court denounced the 
defendant's act, saying, "It was a well-prepared and indiscriminate murder 
committed based on strong murderous intent." The court concluded that "there is 
no choice but to uphold the death penalty."

To help deter heinous crimes, it is necessary to take a firm stance when ruling 
on cases that leave no room for lenience.

(source: The Yomiuri Shimbun)








LEBANON:

Lebanese top judicial authority sentence 22 militants to death in absentia



Lebanon's judicial council has issued 22 members of the militant group, Fatah 
Al-Islam, with the death penalty, and several others with hard labour sentences 
all in absentia.

The sentenced individuals "sought, through different means, to support the 
cause and achieve the goals of this organisation," read the verdict published 
by state press.

They worked to create a base for their "terrorist operations" in Lebanon, which 
include "explosives, murder, robbery and other crimes," the country's supreme 
judicial authority said.

They aim to "weaken Lebanon, and destabilize confidence in its institutions, 
namely the military, amid plans to form a fundamentalist Takfiri state in the 
north, first, before expanding to other areas." The decision mentioned that the 
individuals have taken part in fighting against Lebanese army and security 
forces, leading to the killing of several soldiers and the wounding of others, 
along with destruction and damage caused to military buildings and offices.

Fatah Al-Islam were involved in fighting with the Lebanese army which lasted 
105 days at Nahr Al-Bared, a Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon.

The clashes led to the killing of 170 soldiers and over 200 members of the 
militant group.

(source: Kuwait News Agency)








SAUDI ARABIA:

Saudi beheadings more frequent, 'more legitimate' than ISIS



Saudi Arabian government officials faced extreme backlash after a leaked video 
showed the brutal public beheading of a woman, who proclaimed her innocence as 
a man chopped off her head. The video led to many comparisons to the Islamic 
State who also behead their victims in public.

Interior Ministry spokesman Major General Mansour al-Turki told NBC News the 
punishments are not similar, since the Islamic State "has no legitimate way to 
decide to kill people."

"When we do it in Saudi Arabia, we do it as a decision made by a court," he 
explained. "The killing is a decision, I mean it is not based on arbitrary 
choices, to kill this and not to kill this. When you kill somebody without 
legitimate basis, without justice system, without court, that is still a crime 
whether you behead them or kill [them] with a gun."

Middle East news site Middle East Eye tweeted a picture that shows similarities 
between Islamic State and Saudi Arabia punishments.

The 4 Saudi men were convicted on charges of luring a Saudi man, stealing from 
him and killing him.

The latest beheading brings to 25 the number of people executed across the Arab 
state so far this year. Last year, Saudi authorities executed 87 people, up 
from 78 recorded in 2013.

Danny Makki from the Syrian youth movement in the UK told RT that the West is 
also to blame.

"What we have is a group such as ISIS [Islamic State] which is present in the 
Middle East. It's one of the biggest terrorist movements in the world. And we 
have a government which is allied to Western nations, Saudi Arabia, which 
perpetrates the same form of violence on its own population, acts such as 
beheadings, killings. This is all done in the name of Islam; it???s done in the 
name of religion. It misrepresents religion.

A few weeks before the Saudi king died, a woman was executed in Mecca. She was 
beheaded. And this is the center of Islam. This is the center of pilgrimage for 
millions of Muslims all over the world. And for Saudi Arabia, a country which 
is an American ally, a UK ally, to do this at the same time when ISIS is 
beheading all of these individuals in Syria and Iraq ... It really speaks 
measures for Western silence and complicity with human rights abuses in forms 
of punishment such as this, which is horrific, in Saudi Arabia," he explained.

Rape, murder, apostasy, armed robbery and drug trafficking all carry the death 
penalty under the Saudi penal code.

(source: The Global Dispatch)








PAKISTAN:

Crippled death-row convict moves LHC



A disabled Christian man - who, along with his wife, is facing to death penalty 
for alleged blasphemy and has been languishing in jail for 2 years - has moved 
an appeal in Lahore High Court (LHC) seeking his bail in view of his 
deteriorating health condition.

Shafqat Masih and Shagufta Kausar were arrested on July 20, 2013 after being 
accused of sending a blasphemous SMS to a local cleric. They were awarded the 
death sentence on April 4, 2014. Shafqat, who cannot move without a 
wheel-chair, has moved the LHC for suspension of his punishment till final 
decision on his appeal.M

In his application, he submitted that he has developed bed-sores and may die in 
jail as there is no possibility of a better treatment there.

He said there were serious contradictions in witness accounts against him and 
he is hopeful of an acquittal on his appeal. Shafqat has requested that he be 
released on bail so that he can spend his life with his children and get proper 
treatment. The application will be heard on March 5.

(source: The Express Tribune)



BAHAMAS:

Lawyer Cites Publicity's Effect On Jury In Child Killer's Trial



Court of Appeal judges were told by convicted child killer Kofhe Goodman's 
lawyer that he would seek a deferment of a retrial if the court allowed the 
appeal against his client's murder conviction and death sentence due to the 
publicity of the matter.

Wayne Munroe, QC, was responding to a question posed by Justices Anita Allen, 
Neville Adderley and Jon Isaacs on what the appellant was seeking to achieve if 
the court set aside the conviction and punishment concerning the September 2011 
murder of Marco Archer, 11, of Brougham Street.

As yesterday's substantive hearing was unable to begin due to some parts of the 
trial transcripts being unavailable, the judges sought to determine the 
appellant's end goal.

Mr Munroe explained that the issue of pre-trial publicity of the case and its 
possible effect on the jury was a ground of appeal that was filed.

He added that if the court were to find merit on this ground, in that the jury 
had not been reasonably questioned on their knowledge of media reports in the 
matter, then there would have to be a remedy.

The QC suggested that a deferment of a retrial, until the publicity subsides, 
would be best.

The appellate court adjourned the matter to March 4 for a status hearing.

Mr Munroe was told that he would be given two weeks to comply with the court's 
new practice directive in filing a transcript index outlining the specific 
portions of the transcript on which he intends to rely during the appeal.

This would allow Crown respondent, Director of Public Prosecutions Garvin 
Gaskin, to file submissions in response.

The appellate court put the new measure in place, effective January 23, due to 
cases like Goodman's, whose trial lasted 4 months and had transcripts exceeding 
1,000 pages.

In 2013, trial judge Justice Bernard Turner, in handing down his sentence, 
noted that abducting a child, fracturing his skull with a blow to the head, 
placing a bag around his head and discarding his naked, lifeless body in bushes 
can be considered to be "the worst of the worst" in the guidelines for 
sentencing set out by Parliament.

Justice Turner, in considering the death penalty, regarded the mitigating 
factors and the circumstances of the case - Goodman's previous convictions for 
unnatural carnal knowledge in 1993, attempted murder and causing grievous harm 
in August 1998 - and was "satisfied that the circumstances of this case 
required that a penalty be imposed."

"This case is a clear and compelling case for the ultimate sentence of death, 
to satisfy the requirements of due punishment for the murder of this child and 
to protect this society from any further predatory conduct by this convict at 
any time in the future. Kofhe Edwardo Ferguson Goodman, I hereby sentence you 
to suffer death in the manner authorised by law," the judge had previously 
ruled.

(source: Tribune242)








INDIA:

Rape of Nepalese woman: Women's commission for death to culprits



The state women's commission will recommend death as penalty for the rape and 
murder of a Nepalese woman (28) here, which it has described as horrendous 
crime.

On February 1, the mentally challenged Nepalese woman living with her sister at 
Chinyot Colony here had gone missing; and on February 4, her mutilated body was 
found in a field of a village nearby. Autopsy confirmed rape and multiple 
injuries all over the body. On Friday, state women's commission chairperson 
Kamlesh Panchal and vice-chairperson Suman Dahiya visited the family of the 
victim and met Rohtak senior superintendent of police (SSP) Shashank Anand.

Panchal assured the family that the commission would demand nothing less than 
gallows for the culprits. The commission took a serious note of the allegation 
against the police of being lax in investigation. Local member of Parliament 
Deepender Singh Hooda and local legislator Munish Grover also visited the 
family and promised it support.

SIT activates cyber cell

The special investigation team (SIT) led by deputy superintendent of police 
(DSP) Amit Bhatia has activated its cyber cell for a breakthrough in the case. 
The recovery of the body far from the woman's house has baffled the police, and 
now its cyber cell will to trace the mobile-phone users who were active near 
the crime spot in the past few days.

On Friday, it rounded up several people for questioning.

Nepalese people to hold protest

The crime has outraged the Nepali community. The Mool Pravaha Akhil Bharat 
Nepali Ekta Samaj and Pravasi Nepali Sangh Bharat will assemble their members 
at Mansarovar Park here on Sunday for a candlelight vigil and protest. The 
Nepali organisations has also invited local volunteer bodies to join in 
agitation.

(source: Hindustan Times)








BANGLADESH:

Govt mulls law with death penalty to curb political violence: Suranjit



The government is considering a law providing for capital punishment to 
saboteurs to curb political violence, says Suranjit Sengupta, chairman of the 
Standing Committee on the Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs, reports 
bdnews24.com.

Speaking at a discussion on Friday in Dhaka, he said the government was 
determined to restore peace and order in the country.

His comments comes as a BNP-sponsored month-long violent street campaign to 
press for a snap election has claimed more than 50 lives, mostly in 
fire-bombing.

Both the US and UK said they were deeply concerned over the ongoing political 
violence in Bangladesh.

Neighbouring India has left it to Dhaka to solve its own problems.

Political violence in the run up to the 2014 general elections left a number of 
people, including policemen, dead.

The economy bore the brunt of the violent campaigns.

"A strict law is being formulated to prevent violence," Suranjit Sengupta, also 
the ruling Awami League's Advisory Council member, said.

"It will have provisions for both maximum penalty and life imprisonment.

"We will soon implement what we have discussed," he said.

(source: The Financial Express)








GLOBAL:

The death penalty is a burden on the world



2 Australians citizens face firing squads in Indonesia for drug offences that 
were uncovered as a result of Australian Federal Police tipping off Indonesian 
police.

The drugs were headed to Australia, where the 2 men would have received 
significant sentences had they been convicted.

They could not have been extradited back to Indonesia, because we don't deport 
any prisoner to any place where they might face the death penalty.

Australian officials can inform on their own citizens in situations like Bali, 
where they know execution is probable, but wash their hands of responsibility 
for the unjust deaths caused by their own tip-offs. The government would not 
extradite American Gabe Watson to Alabama if he faced the death penalty for the 
murder of his wife in Queensland on their honeymoon. Watson is white. Andrew 
Chan and Myuran Sukumaran are not. Watson was an alleged killer. Chan and 
Sukumaran are not - they are just drug dealers.

The new Indonesian President Joko Widodo flexed his considerable muscle and 
approved six executions of foreign and local drug dealers in his 1st few months 
of office. On Friday he confirmed that the 2 Australians would be killed this 
month, unfortunately for them the shortest month of the year. The Dutch and 
Brazilian governments were outraged at the recent executions of their citizens 
in Indonesia for drug offences.

Governments who use such terror tactics to impose their will should be careful, 
lest the tactics be turned on them. The French had a tradition during the 1700s 
of quartering prisoners as a public spectacle. The 4 limbs of the convicted 
were tied to 4 oxen that were driven in every which way to tear the person 
apart.

The upper classes on the other hand, if convicted, could purchase death by 
beheading or hanging. The axemen responsible for carrying out these acts 
complained to King Louis XVI of France that the neck bones of the condemned 
were too thick for clean chopping: It was painful and exhausting for them and 
for the victims. Doctor Joseph-Ignace Guillotin argued, as a humanitarian, that 
there should be no capital punishment, but in the interim settled for inventing 
the guillotine. The machines introduced brevity to execution, allowed gravity 
to wield the axe and brought levity to the crowd of onlookers, who stared for 
signs of life in the heads gathered in conveniently located baskets. In time, 
Louis XVI himself, an amateur locksmith, is said to have added to the ultimate 
design of the guillotine. He was, by an ironic twist of both fate and the 
knife, beheaded benignly by his own machine in 1793.

One of the problems of capital punishment is that it is so final. If an appeal 
is ultimately successful or future research - such as DNA evidence - renders 
the conviction a mistaken, it is extraordinarily hard to uphold the appeal and 
bring the dead back to life. In 2002 a brave American Federal Judge ruled the 
death penalty was unconstitutional because there was an undue risk that 
innocent people could be executed. Judge Jed S. Rakoff cited cases in which 
death-row inmates had been exonerated by DNA or other evidence. The government 
argued that DNA testing was now available to all and would reduce the risk of 
mistaken convictions. Judge Rakoff chided the government: "This completely 
misses the point ... what DNA testing has proved beyond cavil, is the 
remarkable degree of fallibility in the basic fact-finding processes on which 
we rely in criminal cases."

Ironically it was 2 expert, genetically qualified lawyers who had destroyed the 
police case against O.J. Simpson who later, perhaps through guilt, set up the 
Innocence Project to use the science to exonerate wrongly convicted people.

The current US Supreme Court has ordered the stay of execution of three 
Oklahoma men on the grounds that the current methods of lethal injection cause 
too much pain and uncertainty. International Big Pharma had refused to ship to 
the government stocks of Sodium Pentothal for injections which work quickly 
and, forgive me, relatively painlessly. No adequate substitute for this drug 
could be found by the best brains in Oklahoma. Until the Supreme Court rules on 
whether the current drug of choice midazolam - which takes up to 40 minutes to 
work - is cruel or unusual punishment, no heads will roll in Oklahoma. Whatever 
else may be said about it, the guillotine was quick and efficient. It would set 
the world upside down if America allowed capital punishment, but only by 
decapitation.

In Saudi Arabia the late King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz al-Saud left this world 
with a rash of beheadings in his last six months of life, handed out for drug 
dealing offences and, in one case, the practice of black magic sorcery. The new 
King Salman, the Lenient One, kicked off his office with four executions in the 
first week. In a defying show of strength and oneupmanship, IS has resorted to 
the traditional witch burning methods of medieval Europe by lighting up an 
unfortunate Jordanian fighter jet pilot. The Jordanian King Abdullah retaliated 
by donning his airforce uniform and threatening to fly missions himself against 
IS. Unlike President Bush, King Abdullah could actually fly and accomplish his 
mission. He ordered the immediate execution of a female terrorist whose bomb, 
strapped to her body, did not go off.

The world is rapidly changing. Princess Sara bint Talal bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, 
38, a senior member of Saudi Arabia's royal family, has filed for political 
asylum in Britain after accusing the Saudi government of plotting to kidnap her 
to smuggle her back to Riyadh. She has been living in a 5-star London hotel 
with her four children and two dogs, guarded by private security, since 2007. 
She had fallen out with her father, Prince Talal, and lived on the favours of 
her uncle Crown Prince Nayef until his death in 2012. Her brother, prince 
Al-Waleed bin Talal, had been, until last week ,the 2nd largest shareholder in 
News Corporation. His withdrawal from Sith Lord Murdoch's Galactic Empire has 
threatened the stability of the Sun King. Princess Sara is battling her older 
brother, Prince Turki, for their dead mother's fortune, which is locked in 
vaults in Switzerland and other places.

There was more than a sense of history repeating itself when Princes Sara was 
asked by a journalist if she was ferried everywhere by Rolls Royce. She 
replied: "I hate Rolls Royces, I love Aston Martins." 6 months after Louis XVI 
was beheaded it is said that, when facing the executioners' block, his wife 
Queen Marie Antoinette queried what the mob was so mad about. "They have no 
bread, Majesty," they told her. "Well then, give 'em croissants for God's 
sake!" she exclaimed.

Chan and Sukumaran could be comforted by reading the great British Empire 
writer Kipling, who wrote: "If you can keep your head when all about you are 
losing theirs and blaming it on you ... if you can dream - and not make dreams 
your master ... if you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, or walk with 
Kings - nor lose the common touch ... yours is the Earth and everything that's 
in it, and which is more, you'll be a Man, my son."

(source: Commentary, Charles Waterstreet; Brisbane Times)



INDONESIA:

Bali 9 duo Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran 'were meant to get life in prison'



The lawyer who represented Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran when they were 
first sentenced to death has made a surprise visit to the 2 men in Kerobokan 
jail, hinting that he is aware of new evidence that could save them.

Muhammad Rifan visited the pair on Saturday and revealed that they were 
originally meant to be sentenced to life in jail but that "intervention" at the 
time ensured they got death.

Mr Rifan, who stopped representing the pair after they got the death penalty 
and failed to win any appeals after being advised to plead innocence, has not 
spoken to the 2 Australians for years.

But yesterday he came, unannounced, to Kerobokan prison to see them and emerged 
to say that he had conveyed new information to Sukumaran which could help them 
in pleading for their lives.

He said the new information or evidence would require support from the 
Australian Government but he refused to explain further.

The pair's current lawyers have foreshadowed further legal action next week in 
a bid to save their lives but have not said what form it would take.

Mr Rifan said that the two Sydney men were meant to be sentenced to life not 
death on the day of their verdict in the Denpasar District Court.

"At that time, they actually will be sentenced to life. There are several 
factors that caused them to be sentenced to death at that time. We saw there 
was intervention at that time," Mr Rifan said.

"The panel of Judges, I am very sure, also feel regret. Because after they 
sentenced them to death, they said to me that actually it was not what they 
want."

Mr Rifan said that he now felt regret at what has transpired and that Chan and 
Sukumaran are now just weeks from being shot dead by firing squad.

"For sure, I feel regret that the legal system is easily interfered with," he 
said.

"We can feel it at that time. So the judges in the Denpasar court, the Bali 
High Court, as well as the Supreme Court did not escape from the intervention 
of the Government at that time," Mr Rifan said.

He said he had provided information to Sukumaran that could help in the future 
legal strategies. Sukumaran undertook to talk to his now lawyers, he said.

Asked why he had come to the jail to see the men on Saturday, Mr Rifan said he 
wanted to give them further information and options to use in any further legal 
action.

And he echoed a view being articulated by many within the jail system in 
Indonesia - Chan and Sukumaran are more use to the system alive not dead.

They have set up and run a host of rehabilitation programs in the jail, 
teaching inmates valuable skills to help them rehabilitate and break the 
revolving cycle of crime and jail.

"They do not deserve to be sentenced to death. They were stupid children not 
thinking about the long term."

It comes as the Australian Embassy in Jakarta was told by the Indonesian 
Foreign Ministry on Thursday that Chan and Sukumaran would die this month. But 
so far no date has been set and the country's Attorney-General has yet to 
confirm details for the next executions.

The Chan and Sukumaran families have been in Bali for the past few weeks, 
keeping a desperate vigil, hoping against hope for a miracle, since learning 
that both men???s Presidential clemency bids had been rejected.

They were at the jail again Saturday visiting both young men, as was the Sydney 
pastor of the church attended by Sukumaran's family.

Mithran Chellappah from the C3 Church said he had known Myuran Sukumaran for 
the past 15 years.

He said in "their state of condemnation" Sukumaran and Chan had achieved much 
more than others, himself included and that allowing them to live would achieve 
much more than killing them.

"They can be a wonderful experience to someone turning their life around," 
Pastor Chellappah said outside the jail.

And former and current jail inmates have written a series of emotional letters, 
pleading for life, some even offering to take their place in front of the 
firing squad.

(source: news.com.au)

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

Prisoners write to save Bali 9 duo----Prisoners in Kerobokan jail are writing 
open letters about how condemned Australians Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan 
should not be executed.



Kerobokan prisoners are writing letters they hope will save the lives of 
Australians Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan - men they regard as their 
mentors, brothers and sons.

Sukumaran, 33, and Chan, 31, have been notified they will be executed this 
month for leading the 2005 Bali 9 attempt to smuggle heroin into Australia.

The news on Friday was a blow to the men and their families, but also to their 
many friends inside the Bali prison.

The pair have initiated various classes that have helped people stay off drugs, 
focusing their minds on productive activities and building skills for life 
after prison.

Their fellow prisoners can't imagine life in jail without the outreach of Chan, 
who is studying to become a pastor, and worry what will become of Sukumaran's 
art school.

They are writing letters - some to President Joko Widodo and his government - 
others addressed to no one in particular, pleading for their friends' lives.

One Indonesian inmate, Rico Richardo, writes that he is willing to take Chan's 
place at the execution, after the Australian paid for his medical care when he 
was gravely ill.

Meanwhile, Sukumaran is funding much-needed surgery for a Filipina inmate, 
Maria Cecilia Jusay Lopez, by selling 2 paintings.

Sukumaran was very concerned to ensure it was arranged before his execution.

"He encourages us that even (though) we are in this prison we can still learn 
more and be a good example to others," she says.

Prisoner I Wayan Sudiasa writes about his life-changing experience in 
Sukumaran's art classes.

"I am amazed at Myuran. I am proud of Myuran," he writes.

"He is a prisoner who was sentenced to death by a judge, who became a coach, 
teacher and painting guide in Kerobokan.

"Try to find Indonesians like Myuran."

Mr Joko is the only person who can spare the men from execution, but under 
political pressure to look decisive, he is enacting a policy of no mercy to 
death row drug offenders.

EXCERPTS OF LETTERS FROM INSIDE:

- Andre Wijaya: "I am a living witness, for 4.5 years with these 2 death row 
inmates. I assure you the 2 inmates have repented ... it can be verified 
directly with every resident of Kerobokan jail."

- Stefanus Mehang: "I know Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran. They are 
dignified, modest and extraordinary personalities. I beg deeply for forgiveness 
for them both."

- Rico Richardo: "If Your Honour Bapak President still insists on executing 
Andrew Chan, I, Rico Richardo as an Indonesian citizen, am ready to replace 
Andrew Chan to be executed."

- Rizki Pratama: "If only the government and the president knew what he's been 
doing in this prison. Andrew Chan does not deserve to receive the death 
penalty."

(source: sbs.com.au)

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

Indonesia must stop executions



Malaysians Against Death Penalty and Torture (Madpet) is disturbed by the 
recent execution of 6 persons in Indonesia in January 2015, and the possibility 
that many more will be executed in the near future.

Indonesia seems to have had an unofficial moratorium on executions for several 
years from 2008 but resumed capital punishment again in 2013. There were 
apparently no executions in 2014.

After President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo took office in October 2014, things 
changed. On or about Jan 18, 2015, 6 persons were executed by firing squad. 5 
foreigners and an Indonesian woman convicted on drug trafficking charges were 
killed.

'President Joko says that Indonesia is in a "state of emergency" with regard to 
rampant drug trafficking across Indonesia, and he believes that this problem 
could be solved by executions. He is wrong, and Madpet reiterates that the 
death penalty does not deter drug offences.

In March 2012, it was revealed in the Malaysian Parliament by then-home 
minister, Hishammuddin Hussein, that the mandatory death penalty has been shown 
to have failed to act as a deterrent. Police statistics for the arrests of drug 
dealers under Section 39B of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952, which carries the 
mandatory death penalty, for the past 3 years (2009 to 2011) have shown an 
increase.

In 2009, 2,955 were arrested under this section. In 2010, 3,700 people were 
arrested, whilst in 2011, 3,845 were arrested. (Free Malaysia Today, March 19, 
2012, 'Death penalty not deterring drug trade')

Malaysian Crime Prevention Foundation vice-chairperson Lee Lam Thye also did 
note in July 2013 that the death sentence had not deterred the drug trade.

It is also now accepted that many persons facing the death penalty for drug 
trafficking are really 'mules', many of whom are young people who have been 
tricked, or those who are financially disadvantaged.

Cases like that of Malaysian Umi Azlim Mohamad Lazim, 24, a graduate from a 
poor Malay family of rice farmers, and young Malaysian Yong Vui Kong who were 
once facing death for drug trafficking, who since then had their sentences 
commuted, have opened many eyes as to why the death penalty need to be 
abolished, especially for drug offences. Malaysia is seriously moving towards 
the abolition of the death penalty.

Indonesia needs to consider the Malaysian experience, and immediately put a 
stop to its plans to execute even more convicted drug traffickers. There is 
really no empirical evidence to support the notion that the death penalty 
serves as an effective deterrent to the commission of crimes.

Further, no criminal justice legal system in the world is foolproof, error-free 
or fail-safe. In the instance of the death penalty, there is no opportunity to 
correct an error, as the execution of the death sentence is irreversible. We 
recall the Taiwan case of Chiang Kuo-ching, a private in the air force, who was 
executed in error in 1997 for a murder, which the Taiwan government did admit 
was an error in 2011.

UN Resolution to establish moratorium

On Dec 18, 2014, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) adopted a 
Resolution to establish a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing 
the death penalty. 117 member states voted in favour of the resolution, 38 
voted against and 34 abstained. This was the 5th time a resolution on this 
issue has been passed.

In December 2012, being the last time, 111 states voted in favour, 41 against 
and 34 abstained. In 2007, only 104 nations that supported. In 2008, this 
increased to 106. In 2010, 108 countries voted in favour and now in 2014, 117 
member countries voted in favour. There is no doubt that the global community 
is more and more for the abolition of the death penalty.

Indonesia, being a member nation of the global community, should adhere to 
these UNGA Resolutions and immediately establish a moratorium on all executions 
in Indonesia.

It has been reported that President Joko has stated that he will reject the 
clemency petitions for all drug traffickers on death row, which is about 57 
persons. This is certainly not proper or just, for each and every application 
for clemency should be considered separately and without prejudice by the 
president on its merits. (Jakarta Post, Jan 30, 2015).

The presidential power to grant clemency is most important in death penalty 
cases as this the last safeguard against wrongful conviction and therefore 
wrongful execution.

Madpet urges Indonesia to immediately stop any further executions, and 
immediately comply with the United Nations General Assembly Resolution and 
establish a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death 
penalty.

(source: Charles Hector is a coordinator of Malaysians Against Death Penalty 
and Torture (Madpet)----Malaysiakini.com)

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

Nigerian Drug Dealer Could Face Firing Squad After Found With 1.7 Kilograms of 
Meth



A Nigerian drug dealer could face the death penalty after he was caught with 
nearly 1.7 kilograms of crystal methamphetamine at his rented home in Central 
Jakarta, police say.

Sr. Comr. Eko Danianto, chief of the Jakarta Police's narcotics unit, said the 
man, who was identified as CO, was arrested on Wednesday at his house in 
Cempaka Putih following tip-offs from local residents.

"The police confiscated 28 packets of crystal meth weighing in total 1,699 
grams hidden in a bag, 1 electric scale, 2 mobile phones, and a passport," Eko 
said.

Police said CO received the drugs from another Nigerian, identified as CN, who 
is at large.

"CN delivers the stuff to CO through a woman with initials MNC in Jakarta," 
said Eko. "We're still developing our investigation to reveal their network."

According to Eko, CO would be charged with article 114 of a 2009 Law on Drugs 
and could face the death penalty.

(source: Jakarta Globe)