June 25
CHINA:
News Release Issued by the International Secretariat of Amnesty
International
China: Annual execution spree looms on UN anti-drugs day
AI Index: ASA 17/026/2004 (Public)----25 June 2004
China will execute dozens and perhaps hundreds of people this week as it
marks UN Anti-Drugs Day on 26 June. Amnesty International is calling on
the Chinese government to halt these executions and to review all future
use of the death penalty.
"We have seen an annual spree of executions in China in the run-up to UN
International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking in previous
years" said Amnesty International. "Yet no convincing evidence has ever
been produced that the death penalty deters would-be traffickers and users
more effectively than any other punishment."
More than 50 people were executed on drug-related charges in just eight of
China's 23 provinces in the single week leading up to Anti-Drugs Day last
year. The total number across China is likely to have been in the
hundreds. Already this year three alleged drug traffickers from Hong Kong
have been executed, in the southern city of Shenzhen on 11 June.
Amnesty International opposes the death penalty in all cases without
exception as a violation of the right to life and the ultimate form of
cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment.
The United Nations has never given any endorsement to the use of the death
penalty for drug-related offences, and the UN Special Rapporteur on
Summary or Arbitrary Executions has called on China to end the use of the
death penalty for drug trafficking.
China faces an extremely serious and growing drugs problem. It borders two
of the world's largest opium-producing areas, the 'Golden Triangle' and
Afghanistan. There are 1.05 million registered drug addicts in China, and
many more are thought to choose not to register. Possession of defined
quantities of drugs triggers a potential death sentence. Five kilos of
cannabis resin, one kilo of heroin or 50g of cocaine can result in the
death penalty being passed.
In the week leading up to 26 June, UN Anti-Drugs Day and government
measures to tackle drug crime are publicized in the Chinese media. Despite
this extra reporting of death sentences, drug-related crime, drug use, and
amounts of drugs seized by customs are all at a high level or actually
rising in China. This reality seriously undermines official claims that
the death penalty is an effective deterrent against drug crime in China.
Background
According to China's Drug Control Bureau, mainland police seized 9.53
tonnes of heroin in 2003, up 2.6 % from 2002. In 2003 5.8 tons of 'ice',
or methamphetamine hydrochloride, was seized, up from 4.8 tons in 2001.
The Chinese National Narcotics Control Commission has stated new addicts
grew at an average rate of 13% over the last 5 years.
Further information
Executed according to law? The death penalty in China:
http://amnesty-news.c.topica.com/maacn6Faa7VyKbb0havb/
Further information on the death penalty:
http://amnesty-news.c.topica.com/maacn6Faa7VyLbb0havb/
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(source: Amnesty International)
********************
Dozens of drug dealers given to death penalty
Dozens of drug dealers were sentenced to death in a series of drug-related
criminal cases across China as the International Day Against Drug Abuse
and Illicit Trafficking draws near.
In southwestern Yunnan province, Tan Minglin and three other people
convicted of smuggling or selling five tons of drugs, including heroin and
ephedrine, were executed after having all their belongings confiscated on
Friday.
South China's Guangdong province cracked a series of such drug-related
criminal cases. Li Qingyuan was sentenced to death while his colleague Lu
Guowu was sentenced a two-year stay of execution with all his property
confiscated. Tan Zhong'an, another accomplice, was given a seven-year jail
term and fined 10,000 yuan(1,200 US dollars) by a local court in Shenzhen
city, which neighbors on Hong Kong.
4 more drug-related suspects, including Liu Shenming, Ma Guoli, Wang
Jianwei and Ye Yuezhen, were also executed respectively by courts in
Fanyu, Huadu, Conghua districts, as wellas a development zone of
Guangzhou, capital city of Guangdong, on Friday.
Another Chen Xue'an and 3 other suspects accused of illegally purchasing
60 kg of drugs by raising over four million yuan (481,000 US dollars) were
sentenced to death in Wenzhou city of east China's Zhejiang province on
Thursday.
Cars, mobile phones and over five million yuan (602,000 US dollars) of
illicit money involved in the case were also confiscated.
In Hangzhou, capital city of the province, a total of 17 suspects were
declared guilty of smuggling drugs, 2 of which were AIDS/HIV carriers
sentenced to death on the same day.
Shaanxi province, northwest China, totally cracked 4,200 such cases and
arrested 2,595 suspects while seizing 21 kg of heroin, said a high
official with the provincial public security bureau ina news conference
held on Friday.
And the police in Urumqi, capital city of China's westernmost Xinjiang
Uygur Autonomous Region, burned approximately 40 kilograms of heroin on
Thursday.
According to the Ministry of Public Security, China cracked a total of
546,900 drug-related criminal cases in the past five years from 1998 to
2003, seizing a total of 51.03 tons of heroin and uprooting 427 hectares
of opium poppy.
Statistics show that 235,600 criminal suspects were arrested for
producing, trafficking and selling drugs over the past 5 year period, and
52.43 tons of "ice", or methamphetamine hydrochloride, 14.73 tons of opium
and 1,412.5 tons of chemicals that could be used to make drugs were
confiscated in the same period.
A source with the ministry acknowledged that strike-hard policies of
China's narcotics control units in combating drug-related crimes and
highly-effective measures and substantial efforts of the related units and
localities across China have paidoff in the war on the drug-related
criminal cases.
The building of drug-free villages and communities, as well as active
involvement in the international narcotics control efforts were all
attributed to the victory over drug-related crimes in thecountry.
However, efforts are urgently required to curb production and sales of
drugs and stem the increase in the number of drug addictsto reduce the
harmful effects of drugs.
China now boasts an anti-drug police force of about 17,000 members, and
its central government has input more than 600 million yuan (72.55 million
US dollars) for drug control efforts over the past 5 years.
(source: Xinhuanet News)
INDIA:
Should the death penalty stay or go?
As Dhananjoy Chatterjee's life hangs between revenge and redemption while
the government considers his wife's clemency petition, an old debate has
sprung up again.
Already in the case of Chatterjee, convicted for raping and killing a
14-year-old girl, human right activists and liberals have asked for the
death sentence to be commuted to life imprisonment. On the other side,
many individuals are outraged at the brutalisation of a young girl.
The arguments on both sides are powerful. The 'pro-lifers' says that the
law cannot play God and take away a life. That an 'eye for an eye' policy
retards civilisation, it might put an innocent to death, that a
life-sentence is as good a deterrent and punishment.
Those who favour the death penalty say that it is the most effective
punishment that sends out a clear signal. They say that the death sentence
gives closure to the family of the victim and shows that the government
and the legal system mean business.
On which side of the fence do you sit on this issue?
*************************
Hangman sulks as hanging stayed
Family members of death row convict Dhananjoy Chatterjee rejoiced as his
hanging Friday was stayed, but his would be executioner sulked fearing his
grandson might lose a job the authorities had promised.
But the news made hangman Nata Mallick feel denied as he sat at his home
in south Kolkata with all preparations made for the execution that was not
to be.
Though he said he did not feel either "good or bad" about the reprieve
granted to Chatterjee, he appeared ruffled and irritable.
"I was ready. The government vehicle was to have picked me up at dawn
(Friday). But now I hear he won't be hanged," Mallick told reporters.
"There is nothing good or bad in this. It is like a policeman doing his
duty on the road and then he is suddenly asked to go home."
Mallick also sulked and expressed his fears that the state government
would not give his grandson a job it had promised in return for the
hanging of Chatterjee.
Mallick, who would have been paid Rs.10,000 for the hanging, had got the
government to agree to give his grandson Prabhat a job in the social
welfare and jails department.
"He was to join from July 1, but now I don't know what will happen. They
can't take away the job now, can they?" asked Mallick, who had waxed and
lubricated with ripe bananas and soap the rope that would have been used
to hang Chatterjee.
4 "trials" with sandbags had also been carried out in the past few days.
Chatterjee's elderly parents and relatives offered prayers of thanks as
news reached their Kuludi village in West Bengal's Bankura district that
the Supreme Court had stayed the execution.
Bengali TV channels showed the convict's parents, enervated from grief,
thanking god and hoping that their son's death sentence would be commuted
to a life term.
Villagers of Kuludi, who had campaigned for remission of Chatterjee's
capital punishment, also celebrated the decision.
Chatterjee was held guilty of raping and killing a 14-year-old schoolgirl
on March 5, 1990 in Kolkata.
He fought his case up to the Supreme Court, which upheld the lower courts'
death verdict against him.
Chatterjee's hanging was stayed following the intervention of the Supreme
Court and President APJ Abdul Kalam late Thursday.
While Kalam forwarded a mercy petition to the home ministry seeking its
opinion on the matter and asked the West Bengal government to put off the
hanging, the Supreme Court stayed the execution to hear an appeal from
Chatterjee's relatives Friday.
It was not known who had moved the latest petition before President Kalam
that he had sent to the home ministry. The president usually goes by the
advice of the ministry on clemency pleas.
A body of eminent Bengali intellectuals and a rights group campaigning for
the abolition of capital punishment had recently written to Kalam, asking
him to remit Chatterjee's sentence.
But the stay on Chatterjee's hanging also sparked off anger among a
section of society here.
The school where the victim, Hetal Parekh, studied held a special prayer
for her Thursday.
"The stay order is shocking. When Hetal was crying for mercy, did anybody
hear her? We thought she would get justice," said Gillian Rosemary Hart,
principal of Welland Gouldsmith School where Parekh studied.
********************
The killer should hang: A mother -- (NILANJANA BHADURI JHA)
It's not easy being mother to a growing daughter. The perversions that
lurk at every corner are frightening, numbing. And if Dhananjoy Chatterjee
escapes the gallows, few mothers will sleep in peace again.
I have a six-year-old daughter. And the way I live my life is defined by
that fact. As a working woman I cannot be everywhere, all the time. But I
worry constantly. How many Dhananjoys can you keep your child away from?
This one was the lift man-cum-caretaker in a building - every building has
one. And a plumber, electrician, male servants, drivers. Even relatives.
I try to be careful. Because I know the responsibility is mine. I don't
let her alone with even close family or friends. Sometimes at the cost of
hurting people. But I am clear that all that matters is her safety. Even
so, as she grows older, how much can I protect?
Short of incarcerating your girl child, total immunity from such dangers
is impossible. The only weapon then is deterrence. Punishment that will
send out the message that you cannot get away by violating a tender child
and then mercilessly smothering her to death. Then, perhaps, the next man
that thinks of raping and killing will think twice.
Even plain murder may have a genuine motive a past hostility, extreme
provocation. But what in the world did 15 year old Kolkata schoolgirl
Hetal Parekh do, except catch the eye of a lust-driven, callous man called
Dhananjoy?
Using the word mercy here is misplaced. Did Dhananjoy feel any mercy when
he raped the child? Did he show any mercy when he killed her thereafter?
Today, inexplicably, he has all sorts of civil rights groups pleading for
his life. There was no one to plead on little Hetal's behalf.
What goes on inside the head of a man to make him do this? If he goes
free, he may well do it again. If he is not hanged, other men shall be
emboldened to do what he did. The key word here is not mercy; it is
justice.
The entire drama of the killers relatives climbing on to a chartered bus
and having a day out in Kolkata protesting against the death sentence, of
the parents and immediate family threatening to commit suicide if he is
hanged is disgusting. If my son had raped and murdered in cold-blood, I
would have perished of shame and guilt anyway. Or shot my son, disowned
him in the least. What are these people made of?
If this is about making a rarest of rare examples, then let it be done.
The just way. The taking of life is reprehensible, even as punishment. But
in the rarest of rare cases, the perpetrator of a terrible crime must be
done to death to put fear in the hearts of others like him.
(source for all: The Times of India)
