[Deathpenalty] death penalty news-----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Oct. 31




IRAQ:

Hussein's lawyer makes a fleeting courtroom visit----After a monthlong
absence, the attorney exits again after spat.


Saddam Hussein's lawyer ended a one-month courtroom absence Monday,
defending his client briefly before getting into another spat with the
judge and leaving again.

Hussein and 6 codefendants face charges of genocide in the 1988 killings
of tens of thousands of Iraqi Kurds by firing squad and chemical warfare.
Most of the victims were civilians, including women and children.

Citing disagreements with Judge Mohammed Orabi Khalefa, the defendants'
privately retained attorneys stormed out of the Baghdad courtroom Sept.
26.

They were replaced by court-appointed lawyers.

Lawyer Khalil Dulaimi and another defense attorney returned before the
judge Monday, complaining about his decision not to allow non-Arab lawyers
to represent the defendants and denying access to what they say is key
evidence.

"If you do not" uphold these complaints, Dulaimi told the judge, "we will
continue our boycott of the court to prove to the world that this is a
political trial and not a legal process."

"You may walk out," the judge replied to the attorney, who then left.

Hussein's team of lawyers has periodically refused to cooperate with the
court, arguing that the forum is little more than a political show trial
and an American-backed propaganda effort.

Hussein stood and spoke, questioning the judge's adherence to the court's
own rules. The former Iraqi president said he didn't have to accept the
court-appointed lawyers, based on his reading of the law.

"The article does not oblige or necessitate for the so-called defendants
to accept the attorney mandated by the tribunal, in spite of their
unwillingness themselves to do so," said Hussein, who studied law in
Cairo. "The article, however, necessitates for the tribunal to mandate an
attorney for the defendant who is unable to hire or bring a lawyer for
himself."

The judge did not address Hussein's complaints, instead summoning the
first of several witnesses who testified against the defendants.

One witness Monday, an 84-year-old woman named Aisha Hama Ameen, said
Hussein's forces had dropped chemical weapons on her small Kurdish village
of Tutma near the provincial capital of Irbil during the holy month of
Ramadan.

"I want him to suffer," she said of Hussein.

"It was Ramadan when he attacked us. Instead of sweets, he gave us poison.

"I want him to be poisoned as he poisoned us," she said.

So far 65 of 80 scheduled prosecution witnesses have testified during 19
court sessions. The trial is to resume today with more prosecution
witnesses.

At a court session scheduled for Sunday in a separate case, Hussein and
seven different codefendants could be handed sentences of death by hanging
for crimes they are accused of committing against the villagers of Dujayl
after a 1982 assassination attempt against Hussein.

Lead defense and prosecution lawyers have both hinted that the date of the
verdict could be postponed.

(source: Los Angeles Times)







SAUDI ARABIA----executions

Saudi Arabia executes Nigerian woman, Saudi man


Saudi Arabia executed a Nigerian woman on Tuesday for drugs smuggling and
a Saudi man for murder, taking to 16 the number of reported executions in
2006.

The official Saudi news agency said Amina Amouri Mohammad from Nigeria was
executed in the coastal city of Jeddah for smuggling cocaine into the
country.

Barakat bin Sadun bin Raja' al-Outaibi, a Saudi man, was put to death in
the capital Riyadh.

Saudi Arabia implements strict Islamic law and usually carries out
executions by public beheading with a sword. The country executed 86
people in 2005 and 36 in 2004.

Officials have not explained the fall in the executions in the first half
of this year, which follows criticism from human rights groups over the
high rates in previous years.

Saudi Arabia executes convicted murderers, rapists and drug traffickers.

(source: Reuters)






INDIA:

10th prisoner in Tihar on death row


Santosh Kumar Singh, convicted of raping and killing Priyadarshani Mattoo,
became the tenth prisoner at the Capitals Tihar Jail to be sentenced to
death.

Jail officials said that except Mohammed Afzal and Devender Pal Singh
Bhullar, whose mercy petitions are pending before the President, the cases
of all others are at different stages of appeal either in the Supreme
Court or in the High Court.

Afzal was convicted in the Parliament attack case while Bhullar was
sentenced for an attempt on the life of Maninderjit Singh Bitta.

Others at Tihar who have been sentenced to death include Sushil Sharma,
who murdered his wife Naina Sahni, cut her into pieces and then burnt her
body in a tandoor. He was sentenced to death on November 7, 2003. Sharma
has appealed in the High Court.

Also on the list is Mohammed Arif alias Ashfaq, the prime accused in the
Red Fort attack case. A city court sentenced Ashfaq to death in October
last year. His appeal is pending in the High Court. Another name on the
list is Hathbir. He was convicted of killing a family and his case is also
in appeal.

According to the Prison Statistics of India, there are 333 convicts
sentenced to death. Fifty-six of them have been given death sentence in
the past 9 months. At least 20 clemency petitions are pending with the
President.

In the past 5 days alone, 2 persons have been sentenced to death for rape
and murder. These include serial killer Umesh Reddy, who was sentenced to
death on October 26.

In September, two sisters, Renuka Kiran Shinde and Seema Mohan Gavit, were
sentenced to death on the charge of killing 13 children, though only five
of the murders could be proved.

The Supreme Court upheld their death sentences. The last execution in
Tihar was in 1989 when Indira Gandhis assassins, Satwant Singh and Kehar
Singh, were hanged.

(source: Hindustan Times)






CHINA:

China Changes Death Penalty Law


China's legislature on Tuesday barred all but the nation's highest court
from approving death sentences, a move that state media called the
country's biggest change to capital punishment in more than 20 years.

China is believed to account for most of the world's court-ordered
executions, putting to death hundreds of people a year for crimes ranging
from murder to such nonviolent offenses as tax evasion. Human rights
groups have been protesting what they call miscarriages of justice and the
extensive, arbitrary use of capital punishment.

The change, which will take effect on Jan. 1, 2007, "is believed to be the
most important reform of capital punishment in China in more than 2
decades," the official Xinhua News Agency said.

The Supreme People's Court announced last year it would start reviewing
death sentences, ending a 23-year-old practice of allowing provincial
courts to have final review. In June, state media said the court had begun
hiring dozens of judges for the task.

Complaints have been rife in recent years that lower-level courts were
mishandling death penalty cases.

"It's great news. This is a big step forward for China's legal system and
human rights," said Li Heping, a prominent Chinese activist lawyer. "I
think the purpose of allowing the Supreme Court to make the final decision
is so that China can control the total number of death penalties and
create an atmosphere of humanitarianism."

The government does not release comprehensive figures on executions but
Amnesty International estimated in its 2005 report that at least 1,770
Chinese were executed that year. The total was believed to be much higher.
At least 2,148 people were executed around the world last year, with 60
executions in the United States, the Amnesty report said.

Tuesday's amendment "deprives the provincial people's courts of the final
say on issuing death sentences," Xinhua said. "Death penalties handed out
by provincial courts must be reviewed and ratified by the Supreme People's
Court."

Xiao Yang, the court's president, said it was "an important procedural
step to prevent wrongful convictions."

"It will also give the defendants in death sentence cases one more chance
to have their opinions heard," Xiao was quoted as saying by Xinhua.

Last year, a woman believed to have been murdered in the 1980s in the
central province of Hunan reappeared alive, 16 years after the man
convicted of killing her was executed.

At the time of the execution, state media reported that the court said the
defendant had confessed. But Chinese police often are accused of torturing
suspects into making confessions.

The high court itself also has been involved in controversial death
penalty decisions.

In December 2003, a purported gang boss who said he was tortured into
confessing to corruption charges was executed in the northeastern city of
Shenyang in an anti-graft crackdown.

A provincial court had issued a reprieve, citing the possibility that the
torture claims might be true, but the Supreme People's Court overruled
that decision and ordered his immediate death.

(source: Associated Press)