[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Jan. 1, 2015




PHILIPPINES:

Death penalty won't stop drug lords, says De Lima



Justice Secretary Leila de Lima won't join calls for the restoration of capital 
punishment in the country despite drug lords being able to continue with their 
criminal activities inside the national penitentiary.

De Lima, who served as chair of Commission on Human Rights during the Arroyo 
administration, said that while there seems to be an apparent failure of the 
penal system to reform heinous criminals, reviving the death penalty would not 
solve the problem.

"The solution really is to cleanse and overhaul the system at BuCor (Bureau of 
Corrections) and NBP (New Bilibid Prison). We have to make sure they (convicts) 
are cut off from criminal network that they use to belong to and that they have 
to be completely incapacitated from committing further criminal or illegal 
activities," De Lima said in an interview.

In fact, she added, it was precisely for this purpose that she has enforced a 
crackdown on criminal activities in the NBP.

After successive raids, confiscation of contrabands - including illegal drugs 
and firearms - and relief of NBP officials, the Justice Secretary said a BuCor 
cleanup oversight team would be put up to perform necessary activities and 
courses of action to cleanse the penitentiary.

She believes that reviving the death penalty "will just destroy the whole 
essence of our penal system, which is restorative."

De Lima reiterated her position that death penalty already "has no place in our 
time."

"Even in the international community, nations are moving towards the abolition 
of the death penalty," she stressed.

De Lima also said that the Philippines was a signatory to the United Nations 
convention on civil and political rights, where one of the undertakings was the 
abolition of capital punishment.

Nonetheless, she admitted that the Congress has the last say on this issue.

Last week, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines and President 
Aquino were one in rejecting a clamor for the revival of death penalty despite 
a renewed spate of heinous crimes such as kidnappings, rape and drug 
trafficking.

(source: Manila Standard Today)








IRAN----executions

4 prisoners hanged, 10 transferred to await execution



The clerical regime in Iran secretly executed 4 more prisoners this week in the 
cities of Noshahr and Shiraz.

3 prisoners were hanged early morning on Tuesday in Adelabad prison in city of 
Shiraz. At least 1 prisoner had been sentenced to death for drug-related 
crimes.

A prisoner hanged in the main prison of Noshahr was in his 30s and a resident 
of the town of Quchan.

Furthermore, a group of 7 prisoners in Kerman and 3 prisoners in the city of 
Bandar Abbas were transferred to isolation on Wednesday to await their 
execution.

Meanwhile, an Iranian official has defended the regime's soaring execution rate 
for drugs offences under so-called 'moderate' President Hassan Rouhani.

Mohammadreza Habibi, the head of judiciary in Yazd province, said 'no sentence 
can replace the death verdict' as a means of reducing drug trafficking across 
the country.

He added: "There are some who are critical of the execution of drug 
traffickers. These should know that if there is no firmness and execution, 
drugs would be easily distributed across the country."

Habibi also acknowledged that based on the regime's own Law of Retribution, 
death sentences are not required for drug related crimes. But some death 
sentences must be handed out 'based on the social situation and state 
verdicts'.

At least 1,200 people have been executed since Rouhani became president, 
including political prisoners, women and those committing crimes when under 18.

Iranian opposition groups and human rights organizations insist executions are 
being carried out to create fear and intimidation in society and to prevent any 
public expression of dissent against the regime.

Earlier this month, a number of human rights organizations demanded that the 
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime stops providing aide to the regime in 
Tehran until it has abolished executions for drug related offences.

(source: NCR-Iran)








SAUDI ARABIA----executions

Saudi Arabia executes 'drug smugglers'



Saudi Arabia says it has beheaded 2 men accused of drug smuggling. More than 80 
people were executed in the Muslim kingdom last year despite appeals to desist 
from the United Nations and human rights groups.

The Saudi interior ministry said 2 convicted Saudis were executed by beheading 
on Thursday. The executions were carried out in the northwestern province of 
al-Juf and the eastern region of al-Ihsa, it said.

It named 1 of those killed as Malik bin Said al-Sayaari and said he had a 
repeat conviction for hashish smuggling.

According to the news agency tallies, at least 83 people were beheaded in Saudi 
Arabia last year, up on 79 executions recorded by Amnesty International in 
2013.

Beheading is the usual method used in Saudi Arabia for crimes punishable by 
death, such as rape, murder, armed robbery and apostasy or insulting the 
Prophet Mohammed.

Last August, Amnesty International condemned what it called a "disturbing 
surge" in executions in Saudi Arabia.

Calls rejected

Saudi authorities have repeatedly rejected calls to halt the kingdom's use of 
the death penalty, saying executions deter would-be offenders.

One of those executed in Riyadh early December was a migrant Filipino worker 
who had been accused of fatally shooting his Saudi employer. The Philippines 
government later said it had tried to stop that execution.

Saudi Arabia ranks 4th behind China, Iran and Iraq for executions performed 
last year in the name of a national state. The United States was 5th.

Jordan ends moratorium

2 weeks ago, Jordan ended an 8-year moratorium on the death penalty by hanging 
11 Jordanian men convicted of murder.

At the time, Human Rights Watch and Penal Reform International accused Jordan 
of backsliding on human rights.

In a recent report, Penal Reform said 140 states and territories had abolished 
the death penalty in law or in practice over the past 50 years. Nearly 60 
retain it.

(source: Deutsche Welle)

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

Saudi Arabia inaugurates 2015 with a beheading



A Saudi convicted of drug trafficking became the 1st person executed in 2015 in 
the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom which beheaded 87 people last year.

Malik bin Said al-Sayaari was put to the sword in the Al-Hasa district of 
Eastern Province after a repeat conviction for hashish smuggling, the interior 
ministry said.

Saudi Arabia has stepped up its use of the death penalty despite repeated 
appeals from the United Nations and human rights watchdogs.

Last year's tally marked a significant increase on the 78 executions recorded 
in 2013.

Rape, murder, apostasy, homosexuality and armed robbery as well as drug 
trafficking are punishable by death under Saudi Arabia's strict version of 
Islamic sharia law.

(source: Agence France-Presse)