[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

July 27



PHILIPPINES:

Solons file 1st house bill seeking to restore death penalty


Members of the House of Representatives will deliberate on the re-imposition of 
the death penalty on its 2nd day of regular session for the 17th Congress on 
Tuesday.

House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez and Capiz Rep. Fredenil Castro co-authored 
House Bill 1 which seeks to impose the death penalty on heinous crimes.

The proposed measure repeals the purpose of Republic Act 9346 which prohibits 
the imposition of death penalty in the Philippines.

Ilocos Norte Rep. Rodolfo Farinas, Camarines Sur Rep. Rolando Andaya Jr., Rizal 
Rep. Michael John Duavit, Tarlac Rep. Carlos Cojuangco, Masbate Rep. Elisa Kho, 
Batangas Rep. Raneo Abu, Cebu Rep. Benhur Salimbangon, Quezon Rep. Danilo 
Suarez and Ako Bicol Partylist Rep. Rodel Batocabe also co-authored the death 
penalty bill.

Lawmakers will also deliberate on House Bill 2 which reverts the minimum age of 
criminal responsibility from 15 years old to 9 years old.

These are among the top priority measures that Alvarez mentioned in his 
inaugural speech upon winning his speakership bid.

Alvarez noted that among ASEAN nations, only the Philippines and Cambodia have 
no capital punishment.

"As the president has said, it is a simple universal law of karma: if you 
borrow from me a thousand pesos, then you must pay back the same amount plus 
interest. If you take a human life especially if you do it deliberately and 
with premeditation, you must pay with your life," Alvarez said in his speech.

(source: Philippine Star)






IRAN----executions

Iran hangs 7 prisoners in 1 day


Iran's fundamentalist regime hanged on Wednesday a group of 6 prisoners in a 
jail in north-western Iran and a 7th prisoner in the north-east of the country.

The 6 men were hanged at 2am on July 27 in the central prison in the city of 
Orumieh (Urmia), the provincial capital of Iran's Western Azerbaijan Province.

They had been transferred to solitary confinement on Tuesday in preparation for 
their execution.

They were identified as: Rahman Fouladi, Abdolmajid Herkuli, Abdollah Qaderi, 
Changiz Shiri, Mojtaba Shirkhani and Ali Talati.

They were accused of drugs-related charges.

A 7th man, identified as Reza Sabzevari, 32, from the town of Nishabur 
(Nishapur), was executed in the nearby city of Mashhad in north-eastern Iran. 
He had 2 children aged 2 and 10 and had been locked up in Mashhad Prison for 
some 18 months.

The mullahs' regime hanged a man in public in the town of Songhor, western 
Iran, on Monday. On Saturday the regime hanged 3 prisoners in a jail in the 
Central Prison of Rasht, northern Iran.

More than 270 Members of the European Parliament signed a joint statement on 
Iran last month, calling on the European Union to "condition" its relations 
with Tehran to an improvement of human rights.

The MEPs who were from all the EU Member States and from all political groups 
in the Parliament said they are concerned about the rising number of executions 
in Iran after Hassan Rouhani took office as President 3 years ago.

Amnesty International in its April 6 annual Death Penalty report covering the 
2015 period wrote: "Iran put at least 977 people to death in 2015, compared to 
at least 743 the year before."

"Iran alone accounted for 82% of all executions recorded" in the Middle East 
and North Africa, the human rights group said.

There have been more than 2,500 executions during Hassan Rouhani's tenure as 
President. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation 
in Iran in March announced that the number of executions in Iran in 2015 was 
greater than any year in the last 25 years. Rouhani has explicitly endorsed the 
executions as examples of "God's commandments" and "laws of the parliament that 
belong to the people".

(source: NCR-Iran)






SAUDI ARABIA:

Saudi court sentences 2 to death for killing army colonel: Media


A Saudi court sentenced 2 men it said were Al-Qaeda followers to death on 
charges of decapitating a Saudi intelligence service colonel in 2007, local 
media reported on Tuesday.

The men attacked Colonel Nasser al-Othman at his farm near the city of Buraidah 
in northern Saudi Arabia, tied him up and severed his head because they viewed 
him as an apostate, online news website sabq.org said, citing the court ruling.

Between 2003 and 2006, Al-Qaeda carried out a campaign of attacks in the 
kingdom against Western and Saudi targets that killed hundreds of people.

Since stamping out the insurgency, Saudi Arabia has convicted and sentenced 
hundreds of people to prison or death for militancy. It executed dozens on Jan. 
2.

In Tuesday's verdict a 3rd man was sentenced to 30 years in jail for attempting 
to kill the commander of emergency forces in Saudi Arabia's northern Qassim 
region, Dubai-based al-Arabiya television channel said.

The court ruling, published by Al-Arabiya on its website, did not identify the 
3 convicted men.

A Justice Ministry spokesman confirmed the court verdict was an initial ruling 
which was subject to levels of appeal before it can be implemented.

Death sentences must be signed by the king before they are carried out.

Human rights groups say Saudi Arabia's justice system is flawed and that its 
campaign against Islamist militants has also been used to suppress peaceful 
dissent.

Saudi Arabia says the system is fair and independent.

Since 2014 Islamic State, like Al-Qaeda a predominantly Sunni hardline group, 
has carried out attacks in the kingdom that have killed dozens and led to 
hundreds of arrests.

(source: ahramonline)

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

Critical situation of Shiite Muslims in Saudi Arabia: 9 minors at risk of 
execution


Saudi Arabia said on 28 February 2014 in a report submitted to the Human Rights 
Council of the United Nations: (the death penalty fall for minors, and it is 
not carried out on the children at all, and it should be noted that the 
definition of a child under KSA polices agreed with Article (1) of the 
Convention on the Rights of the Child), but in the 2nd of January 2016 and 
after 20 months from the report, Saudi Arabia executed 47 people, including 
four minors. To form the 2nd-largest mass execution in its history, after the 
execution of 61 people in 7 January 1980.

The execution of 2 January 2016, raised denunciations succession, as expressed 
by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's dismay, it was considered that the trials 
-at referring to the execution of Sheikh Nimr- raised serious concerns about 
the nature of the charges and the fairness of the trial. Also the High 
Commissioner for Human Rights at the United Nations Zeid Ra'ad Al-Hussein 
expressed his regrets of executions carried out by Saudi Arabia urging them to 
ban executions, and he express concern that the provisions did not meet a 
strict set of substantive and procedural requirements. The High Representative 
for Security and Foreign Policy Affairs in the European Union, Ms. Federica 
Mogherini, also raised the hazardous concerns regarding freedom of expression 
and respect for basic civil and political rights, and she confirmed that they 
must be protected in all cases, including in cases of anti-terrorism.

Saudi official bodies including the Interior Ministry and the Justice Ministry, 
rejected the criticism and claimed that the provisions are (under formulation 
in defense guarantees and, are the judgment is confirmed only after exhausting 
all levels of litigation). The National Society for Human Rights, held that 
(trials met the legality and due process of law and the principles and rules of 
fair trial and get convicted on the guarantees).

European Saudi Organization for Human Rights, Confirms that according to some 
of the cases that it watched and documented, the Saudi government committed 
during the executions violations of a number of international conventions, 
where did it didn't get the conditions of a fair trial, and the executions were 
based on charges extracted under torture, as committed major violations, which 
contained the Children Rights Agreement that Saudi Arabia joined.

Ali Saeed Al-Rebeh, was of the cases the organization could track the progress 
of the trial and document what happened to him from violations. He was arrested 
on 12 February 2012, and was then at the age of eighteen years and two months, 
and he accused of taking part in demonstrations in February of 2011, and other 
charges when he was 17 years old, and he was executed based on those charges.

A documentary film pointed that some of who were arrested by Saudi Arabia on 
suspicion of belonging to al-Qaeda were at young age and were not aware of the 
reality of things. Although the trials in Saudi Arabia are not transparent, and 
it is difficult to access information about each of the executed in the 2nd 
January 2016, but it was known there were other minors : Mishaal Hammoud 
al-Faraj (17 years) - Amin Mohamed al-Ghamdi (17 years) - the Chadian Mustafa 
Muhammad Tahir Abkar (14 years). The available information indicates that they 
were arrested in raids in June 2003 in Khalidiya Mecca neighborhood, and in 
January 2004, and there ages were below 18, and as explained at some of the 
interviews and documentaries, some of them dropped their militant thoughts, and 
in the context of what was expounded on Saudi media, they didn't faced specific 
crime that deserve penalty, as they were nearly 13 years in prison before being 
executed. The police chief of Mecca sais that there are children who would have 
thought that they was brought to attend Quranic courses.

The European Saudi Organization for Human Rights (ESOHR), called the Saudi 
government for a transparent and unannounced audits on 2nd January 2016 
executions, and calls for an involvement of neutral points of human rights and 
legal verification, which led to the implementation of these executions, which 
included 4 minors.

9 minors at risk of execution:

Despite the flaws and shortcomings apparent in the course of justice, which 
claimed the killing of 4 minors in the January 2, ESOHR documented the 
existence of 9 minors that are threatened currently on death row, and they are 
distributed on different situations, among who may be killed at any moment, and 
those who received a ruling elementary death and awaiting appeal, they are: Ali 
al-Nimir, Abdullah alZaher, Dawood al-Marhoon, Hussein Ali alBata, Saeed 
Mohammed alSkafi , Salman Amin al-Koraysh, Mojtaba alSuwaiket, Abdullah Salman 
Al Surih, Hassan Abdul Wahab Al Jazer.

Some of them were arrested at an age of less than 18 years old, and some were 
arrested over the age of eighteen, but they faced charges related to less than 
18 years of age. ESOHR documented cases of some of them in previous reports, 
some of whom had been tortured to extract confessions, as practiced with each 
deception and coercion methods, and some of the confessions recorded them had 
been written by interrogators handwriting and coerced into signing, and the 
trials lacked to the conditions of a fair trial.

ESOHR reminde the Saudi government to her statement, in 28 February, 2014: (the 
death penalty for minors fall, and it's not carried out on the children at 
all).

As we can see in ESOHR, in the base of many facts, it is incumbent on the Saudi 
government to punish all who are contributed to the abuses of minors, who were 
killed in the 2 January 2016 and they are: Mishaal Hammoud alFaraj - Ali Saeed 
Al Rebeh - Amin Mohamed alGhamdi - Mustafa Mohammed Taher Abkar, from the 
moment of arrest until the murder.

ESOHR also calls for redress the sentences of 9 minors who faced the death 
penalty now: Ali alNimr, Abdullah alZaher, Dawood alMarhoon, Hussein Ali 
alBata, Saeed Mohammed alSkafi, Salman Amin Al Koraysh, Mojtaba alSuwaiket, 
Abdullah Salman Al Surih, Hassan Abdul Wahab Al Jazer, and to punish the 
shareholders and the legal related to the abuses, and to release them and 
retrial in which all of the elements and conditions of a fair trial is 
completed.

ESOHR also found through the follow-up of cases of minors, such as the case of 
Ali Al Rebeh, or the cases of minors currently threatened with death, that 
there is a vast difference between the existing laws for minors in the paper, 
and between the treatment applied on the ground. We draw the attention of the 
Saudi government to the importance of the practical commitment to full domestic 
and international laws. It does not make sense to launch a theory in 
international forums about the systems started in Saudi Arabia permits, without 
the practical commitment on the ground, especially with respect to the 
execution of minors. The Saudi Arabia should stop using the official media in 
promoting incorrect accusations to minors, and launch provisions through the 
media before the results of the trial, as the government must open the way for 
the defendants or their lawyers or their families in the local media, because 
using media to show only the official view confirm that it is used in unfair 
practices.

(source: AhlulBayt News Agency)

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

Over 100 Executions Since January 1---- Jordanian Faces Death Penalty for Drug 
Smuggling


Saudi authorities have executed 108 people since January 1, 2016. The year 
began with a mass execution on January 2, of 47 men convicted of 
terrorism-related crimes. Since then, authorities have executed 13 people for 
nonviolent drug smuggling, 47 for murder, and 1 for rape. Saudi authorities are 
on track to match the 158 executions in 2015, and have already surpassed the 88 
in 2014.

Saudi authorities have executed more than 100 people since January 1, 2016.

An imprisoned Jordanian man, Hussein Abu al-Khair, may face the death penalty 
after a Saudi court convicted him in January 2015 of attempting to smuggle 
amphetamine pills into Saudi Arabia by car. Abu al-Khair alleges that a Saudi 
court convicted him based on a confession he signed under torture.

"Executions are never the answer to stopping crime, especially when they result 
from a flawed justice system that ignores torture allegations," said Sarah Leah 
Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. "There is simply no excuse 
for Saudi Arabia's frequent use of the death penalty for nonviolent drug 
crimes."

Abu al-Khair's trial judgment, which Human Rights Watch reviewed, says that 
Saudi authorities arrested him on May 18, 2014, as he was attempting to enter 
the country by car at the al-Durra border crossing, between the southern 
Jordanian port city Aqaba and the Saudi town of Haql. The judgment states that 
the border authorities searched Abu al-Khair's car and found 3 bags hidden in 
the fuel tank filled with over 290,000 amphetamine pills.

A family member who has spoken to Abu al-Khair by phone told Human Rights Watch 
that he denies smuggling the drugs. He told the family member that he only 
signed a confession admitting to drug smuggling after authorities beat and 
tortured him for 12 days, including suspending him upside down by the ankles 
and beating him with sticks. The trial judgment says that Abu al-Khair recanted 
his confession in court, stating that it was merely "the words of the 
investigator." Nevertheless, the judge accepted the original confession as 
evidence and sentenced Abu al-Khair to death in January 2015. Abu al-Khair did 
not have access to a lawyer before or during the trial, the family member said.

Abu al-Khair filed an appeal in January 2015, but has received no information 
about the status of his case, the family member said. He is in Tabuk prison.

Of the 108 people executed so far in 2016, 86 were Saudi citizens. Among the 
foreigners executed, 3 Jordanians and three Pakistanis were each convicted on 
drug smuggling charges.

International standards, including the Arab Charter on Human Rights, ratified 
by Saudi Arabia, require countries that retain the death penalty to use it only 
for the "most serious crimes," and in exceptional circumstances. In 2012, the 
United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary 
executions stated that in countries that still use the death penalty, it should 
be limited to cases in which a person intentionally committed murder, not to 
punish drug-related offenses.

Human Rights Watch has documented longstanding due process violations in Saudi 
Arabia's criminal justice system that make it difficult for a defendant to get 
a fair trial, including in capital cases. Human Rights Watch analyzed seven 
trial judgments that the Specialized Criminal Court handed down in 2013 and 
2014 against men and children accused of protest-related crimes following 
popular demonstrations by members of the Shia minority in 2011 and 2012 in 
Eastern Province towns. In all 7 trials, detainees alleged that confessions 
were extracted through torture, but judges quickly dismissed these allegations 
without investigation, admitted the confessions as evidence, and then convicted 
the detainees almost solely based on these confessions, in some cases 
sentencing them to death.

The Death Penalty Worldwide Database, which collects information on executions 
across the globe, shows that Saudi Arabia has one of the highest execution 
rates in the world, and applies the death penalty to a range of offenses that 
do not constitute "most serious crimes," including drug offenses and "sorcery." 
Saudi Arabia trails only Iran in the Middle East for executing the highest 
number of people each year. Since the start of 2016, Iran has reportedly 
executed at least 216 prisoners, according to Iran Human Rights Documentation 
Center.

Human Rights Watch opposes capital punishment in all countries and under all 
circumstances. Capital punishment is unique in its cruelty and finality, and it 
is inevitably and universally plagued with arbitrariness, prejudice, and error.

In 2012, following similar resolutions in 2007, 2008, and 2010, the UN General 
Assembly called on countries to establish a moratorium on the use of the death 
penalty, progressively restrict the practice, and reduce the offenses for which 
it might be imposed, all with the view toward its eventual abolition. UN 
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has also called on countries to abolish the death 
penalty.

(source: Human Rights Watch)






TRINIDAD:

Former T&T attorney general wants death penalty implemented


Former attorney general Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj has called on the government to 
ensure that the death penalty is carried out here, saying he could not 
understand why the problem of crime cannot be solved or reduced in Trinidad and 
Tobago.

"I could not understand why it is that the government is spending all this 
money on the Ministry of National Security but the country cannot be safe.

"It needs a situation in which the criminal must know that if he does the crime 
he or she will be detected, will be convicted and will be sentenced and the 
death penalty will be carried out," he said.

The last time the death penalty was carried out in Trinidad and Tobago, was in 
1999 when Maharaj served as attorney general in the Basdeo Panday 
administration.

Dole Chadee and members of his criminal gang were hanged over 4 days in June 
and July for the murder of one of their alleged associates and his family.

On July 28, 1999, Anthony Briggs and Wenceslaus James were hanged.

Trinidad and Tobago is among 13 Caribbean countries that retain the death 
penalty and it is estimated that between 59 and 80 prisoners are currently on 
death row in eight Caribbean countries.

Since the 1993 Pratt and Morgan ruling by the London-based Privy Council, which 
is still the final court for several Caribbean countries despite the 
establishment of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) in 2001, the death 
penalty cannot be carried out if the prisoner has been under sentence of death 
for more than 5 years. In those cases the sentence is automatically commuted to 
life imprisonment.

In February 2011, the then People's Partnership government sought to table 
legislation that would have allowed for the resumption of hangings, but the 
"Hanging Bill" as it was then termed, was defeated after the then government 
failed to get the required support from the opposition to amend the 
constitution.

Maharaj, speaking at the annual meeting of the Oilfield Workers Trade Union 
(OWTU), said the country does not need more laws to solve the crime problem.

"It may help, we have the laws, what we need is implementation and we need a 
passion," he added.

So far this year more than 250 people have been murdered in Trinidad and 
Tobago.

(source: Jamaica Observer)