Oct. 30
AUSTRIA:
Death penalty opponents drape 'Mankiller' banner over Schwarzenegger's
name at stadium
Activists opposed to the death penalty scaled the roof of a soccer stadium
named for Arnold Schwarzenegger on Friday and unfurled a banner covering
the California governor's name with the word "Mankiller."
The activists said they were protesting Schwarzenegger's support for
capital punishment in California. The death penalty is illegal in Austria,
where Schwarzenegger was born and began his bodybuilding career.
"We decided to pointedly protest the death penalty in California a few
days before the U.S. presidential election" next Tuesday, said Peter
Rosenauer, a spokesman for the group Resistance for Peace.
"The Republican governor of California and close political confidant of
U.S. President George W. Bush has not renounced the death penalty," he
said.
2 members of the group dressed in blue workmen's overalls walked unnoticed
into Schwarzenegger Stadium in Graz, about 200 kilometers (120 miles)
south of Vienna, and used a ladder to reach the roof and cover
Schwarzenegger's name with the banner.
>From the ground, with the banner in place, the stadium's main sign read
"Arnold Mankiller Stadium" for about 2 hours before authorities were
called to the scene to remove the label.
Graz's stadium was renamed on June 20, 1997, to mark the 50th birthday of
Schwarzenegger, who was born in the nearby village of Thal. He became a
naturalized U.S. citizen in 1984.
Although Schwarzenegger and his films remain hugely popular in his
homeland, Austrian opponents of the death penalty said earlier this month
they were reviving their drive to rename the 15,350-seat stadium.
Local activists with the Green Party and the Communist Party had pressed
the council to change the stadium's name after Schwarzenegger earlier this
year refused to grant clemency to a condemned murderer who had faced
execution in California. The killer, Kevin Cooper, won a stay of execution
just hours before he was to be put to death.
(source: Associated Press)
UGANDA:
Rwakasisi out of death row
Former internal affairs minister Chris Rwakasisi, on death row in Luzira
Prisons, has been moved from the condemned section to the general prison,
Boma, sources said yesterday, reports Emmy Allio.
Sources said the transfer could mean that Rwakasisi was being prepared for
release. They said President Yoweri Museveni might free him.
Senior assistant commissioner of prisons for administration David
Nsalasatta said the former Obote II minister was sick and was moved for
medical reasons but did not name the disease.
"He is not very sick, but he was transferred to Boma where medical
facilities exist. There is nothing peculiar about this transfer,"
Nsalasatta said.
He said, "Congestion is a major problem for us. No prisons have been built
since the 1960s."
He said there were about 300 inmates on death row.
In 1998, Rwakasisi was sentenced to death by Justice Ignatius Mukanza for
murder. He was apprehended in Jinja in July 1985 by Tito Okello soldiers
while trying to flee the country following the ouster of the Uganda
Peoples Congress (UPC) regime.
He committed the offence in 1981 when he was the state minister in for
security and head of the defunct National Security Services (NSS).
Together with an NSS operative, Elias Wanyama, he kidnapped and killed
Rwanchwende, George Kananura, Rwabutoto, Hajji Mbiringi, Nuwagaba,
Muhumuza and Mwine. The Supreme Court rejected his plea.
In 2000, Museveni told a radio station in Mbarara that he would not sign
the decree to hang Rwakasisi.
Sources said when the former Central Region governor in Idi Amins regime,
Lt. Col. Nasur Abdalla, was about to go free in 2001, he was first
transferred to Boma.
(source: New Vision)
INDONESIA:
On death penalty -- While Indonesians view certain foreign countries as
models, very few consider following the lead of European countries.
Most Indonesians look first to East Asian countries -- such as Singapore
and China -- with their image of discipline and prosperity, or Thailand
and Malaysia, which combine modernity and tradition. Regular executions
occur in these countries, and symbolize, to some people, the order and
resolve that is lacking in Indonesia.
Some people think Indonesia should emulate West Asian countries, such as
Iran and Saudi Arabia. The governments of those countries also execute
people for a wide range of crimes. Admirers of such countries see the
shooting of drug smugglers as a positive step toward the repressive
society of their prayers.
For Western-oriented Indonesians, the dominant influence is the United
States. Apart from Cuba, the U.S. was the only Western country that
executed anybody in 2003. Moreover, American judges use the death penalty
disproportionately against African-Americans, so that the white majority
perceive it as a defense against the "menacing black man". Similarly,
Indonesian judges condemn to death mainly Nepalese, Indians, Africans or
sometimes Indonesians who are the girlfriends of Africans, thus ensuring
continued popular support.
But there is also another reason why executions are used particularly for
drug crimes. Whereas the culprit of an individual case of murder is clear,
drug traders serve as specimen culprits, guilty for all society's problems
relating to drug misuse. In reality, everyone needs to support a rational
and humane way of managing an age-old problem, but most people prefer to
cast off their responsibility by heaping heavier punishments on the
scapegoats, in this case the drug couriers. Thus, the more the war on
drugs fails, the greater the demand for more executions.
Against this background, even if the president actually opposed the death
penalty, he would not say so. Clemency for terrorists would be decried by
foreign governments as weakness in the War on Terror. Clemency for drug
smugglers would be resented by the president's allies as weakness in
opposing social vice and seized on by his opponents as weakness in law
enforcement. Thus, prospects for preventing executions through political
avenues are poor.
JOHN HARGREAVES Jakarta
(source: Letter to the Editor, Jakarta Post)
