[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Sept. 30



JAPAN:

Double-killer's death penalty stands


The killer of 2 pachinko parlor employees in Gunma Prefecture in 2003
should hang for his crimes, the Tokyo High Court ruled Friday in upholding
the death penalty for the accused.

Mitsunori Onogawa, 29, was convicted of strangling Tsunehisa Nemoto, 47,
on Feb. 23, 2003, in the village of Miyagi, which is now part of the city
of Maebashi, and dumping his corpse in a river, stealing a key to the
pachinko parlor Nemoto worked for and 3 million yen in cash from the
parlor.

He was also convicted of strangling Makoto Ishibashi, 25, a worker in
another pachinko parlor in Gunma, on April 1, 2003. He and his accomplice,
Tomoaki Takanezawa, 39, dumped the body in the same river, stole a key to
the parlor, but failed in an attempt to burglarize it.

Takanezawa's death sentence was finalized in June.

The Saitama District Court said in its ruling in March 2004 that the pair
committed "cruel acts out of greed for money."

Onogawa had appealed the district court ruling. Takanezawa appealed but
retracted it.

(source: The Japan Times)






GLOBAL:

UN expert seeks end to death penalty for children


Countries where capital punishment is practiced should exempt children
under 18 -- or adults convicted while minors -- from the death penalty, a
U.N. human rights expert said in a report released on Friday.

Only 3 countries -- China, Pakistan and Iran -- have executed offenders
younger than 18 years of age in the last 2 years, according to Amnesty
International. Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, asked by U.N. Secretary General Kofi
Annan to conduct the world body's first in-depth study on violence against
children, also called on all 192 U.N. member-nations to provide children
with universal heath care and social services as well as legal help when
they have been the victims of violence.

The report was intended to provide a global snapshot of violence against
children and offer ways for governments to prevent their abuse. The United
Nations defines a child as anyone under the age of 18.

The U.S. Supreme Court abolished the death penalty for juveniles in the
United States in March 2005. At the time, more than 20 states allowed
capital punishment and 70 death row inmates faced execution for murders
committed when they were 16 or 17 years old.

A handful of other countries still have laws allowing executions of
juvenile offenders but say they have no plans to carry them out.

Pinheiro's report looked at violence against children in the family, the
workplace, school, institutions and the community. It did not examine
children drawn into armed conflict as fighters or sex slaves, a practice
found in conflicts in a number of countries, most of them in Africa.

It urged governments to end harmful traditional practices like early and
forced marriages, binding, scarring, branding and other violent initiation
rites.

The main U.N. tool for protecting children is the 1989 Convention on the
Rights of the Child. The United States and Somalia are the only 2
countries yet to ratify it.

(source: Reuters)






INDIA:

'Afzal's death penalty shouldn't be politicised'


The BJP on Friday said the death sentence awarded to Parliament attack
plotter Mohammad Afzal 'Guru' should not be politicised as it was an
attack on the democracy and the sovereignty of the country.

On Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad seeking presidential
clemency for Afzal, who will be hanged on October 20, 2006 BJP spokesman
Prakash Javadekar said, "People involved in Parliament attack should be
hanged. It was an attack on the democracy and sovereignty of the country,
which should not be politicised or linked with any religion."

"There were about 800 MPs, including top national leaders, when fidayeens
attacked Parliament. And, if the security forces had not countered it
successfully, the damage could have been enormous," he said.

Javadekar, who was attending BJP's Vande Mataram celebrations in Jammu,
also accused Congress of playing vote bank politics on the 'National Song'
and favouring divisive forces.

"Vande Mataram is not only the National Song but a symbol of freedom
struggle," he said.

On Indo-Pak talks, the spokesman said it would not yield any result till
Islamabad stops training camps of terrorists and infiltration to this
side.

(source: United News of India)