[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

June 5


GLOBAL:

Italian lawmakers press for UN vote on death-penalty moratorium


Parliamentarians from Italy's Radical Party have staged a sit-in protest
at the headquarters of Italian state television network RAI, demanding
news coverage of a proposal for a worldwide moratorium on the death
penalty.

The UN proposal has backing from the Italian government coalition. But the
proposal will expire in July unless it is approved by a majority of the
192 member-states at the UN. Radical Party lawmaker Maurizio Turco claims
that 94 countries have indicated their support, and is urging an
aggressive Italian effort to bring the matter to a vote.

Describing the conditions facing demonstrators at the RAI building, Turco
said, "We have a bathroom, and RAI is permitting us to smoke in a small
garden inside the building."

(source: CWNews.com)






SAUDI ARABIA----executions

3 Afghans beheaded in Saudi for drug trafficking


3 Afghans convicted of drug trafficking were beheaded in Saudi Arabia on
Tuesday, the interior ministry announced, adding to a total already more
than double the number of executions in 2006.

Mohammed Sakhi, Akbar Omar and Farid Uld Jawid were executed by the sword
in the Red Sea city of Jeddah after being caught smuggling heroin
concealed in their stomachs, it said in a statement carried by the SPA
news agency.

The beheadings bring to 90 the number of executions announced by the Saudi
government so far this year.

For the whole of 2006, at least 37 people were executed, while 83 were put
to death in 2005 and 35 the year before, according to AFP tallies based on
official statements.

Executions are usually carried out in public in Saudi Arabia, which
applies a strict form of sharia, or Islamic law. Rape, murder, apostasy,
armed robbery and drug trafficking can all carry the death penalty.

(source: Agence France Presse)






EU/JAPAN:

EU confront Japan on death penalty


As it hosts one of the last country summits of its EU Presidency, Germany
should not forget human rights concerns at todays meeting with Japan.

Although Japan is a major contributor of humanitarian aid abroad, it
continues to have some serious human rights issues at home, starting with
the fact that it is one of the few industrialized countries to practice
the death penalty. Since executions were resumed on 25 December 2006,
seven people have been hanged in Japan.

In a letter Amnesty International urged the German Presidency, in light of
the EU guidelines on the death penalty, to ask that Japan takes practical
steps to abolish the death penalty. The organization also urged the
Presidency to raise the issue of forced confessions that continue to occur
under a pre-trial detention system, which fails to meet international
standards.

"Japan is often associated with modernity but its capital punishment
system is anything but. On the contrary, it has medieval features such as
executions by hanging and a secrecy policy whereby sometimes even the
prisoner is not notified of the execution", said Dick Oosting, Director of
Amnesty Internationals EU Office.

Prison conditions under which prisoners are held are another serious cause
of concern to Amnesty International. Death row prisoners are held,
sometimes for decades, under a regime of solitary confinement. Contact
with the outside world is reduced to infrequent and supervised visits,
television is denied and books limited. As a result, several inmates are
reported to have become mentally ill.

The human rights organization also urged the EU Presidency to raise the
issue of Japans military sex slaves during the Second World War, known as
"comfort women".

"The failure of Japanese authorities to offer full apologies and
compensation to all survivors of sexual slavery is another stain on Japans
human rights record that should be raised at the summit" said Oosting.

(source: Amnesty International EU Office)




IRAN:

Iranian Resistance calls for stay of execution of Mr. Khaled Hardani by
the mullahs' regime


The mullahs' henchmen have informed Mr. Hardani, who has spent 7 years in
prison, that soon he will be executed. In 2005, under international
pressure his execution sentence and that of 2 other prisoners was
suspended.

In fear of increasing popular uprisings and growing social unrest, the
regime is trying to create an atmosphere of terror by turning to more
arbitrary executions and other medieval and brutal punishments.

The Iranian Resistance called on the United Nations Secretary General,
High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN Human Rights Council, and all
international human rights organizations to condemn the systematic human
rights violations in Iran. It also called for the urgent measures to save
Mr. Hardani's life.

(source: Secretariat of the National council of Resistance of Iran)






LIBYA/EGYPT:

Libya postpones execution of 10 Egyptians


Libyan authorities decided on Sunday to delay the execution of 10
Egyptians convicted of murder pending the results of negotiations with the
families of the victims, newspaper reports said.

Libyan law allows the lifting of a death sentence only if the family of
the victim accepts compensation or pardons the murder convict. According
to sources from both the Egyptian embassy in Tripoli and the Egyptian
Foreign Ministry, this is what the Egyptians are trying to secure.

Senior consular official Gamal al-Dairouti told the Middle East News
Agency that the embassy is making efforts to convince the families of the
victims to accept blood money.

(source: LegalBrief)