March 1
GLOBAL:
Governments use death penalty to crackdown on religious minorities
Various countries that include China and Iraq are disproportionately using the
death penalty against people from religious minorities, not for any criminal
misdeeds, but merely based on their faith and religious beliefs, according to
Raphael Chenuil-Hazan, the Executive Director of Ensemble Contre la Peine de
Mort (Together Against the Death Penalty), a French NGO that aims to abolish
capital punishment around the world.
The list of communities who have been victimised by the crackdown includes
Tibetan Buddhists, the Uighurs (the Turkic-speaking minority in China’s western
Xinjiang province and who are Sunni Muslims with close ethnic and cultural ties
to Central Asia), and Chinese Christians. Each of the communities has seen a
number of their followers sentenced to death solely for their religious
identities.
“It’s a disgrace that some regimes, including China, Iraq, and Iran, are using
the death penalty against people from religious groups who are condemned merely
for their religious beliefs…This cannot be allowed to continue,” said
Chenuil-Hazan, who added, “These people have been condemned not because of any
criminal wrongdoing or misdeeds, but because they believe in something that a
particular regime does not agree with. They are being targeted for their
beliefs and the international community needs to wake up to what is going on
and take appropriate action.”
According to Chenuil-Hazan, the security services’ crackdown on religious
minorities has now extended to their legal representatives, who are also often
imprisoned and tortured for having taken on cases dedicated to human rights.
Recently in China, up to 500 lawyers representing human rights activists were
detained for acting as legal counsel to individuals who have been targeted by
their respective governments.
“They are still in prison and we know little or nothing about their whereabouts
or their welfare,” Chenuil-Hazan said, adding, “We have to be brave enough to
raise these issues so that the wider community knows what is going on.”
Chenuil-Hazan made his comments while speaking at the 7th World Congress
Against the Death Penalty, which is co-hosted by the European Union and the
Kingdom of Belgium. Held every three years, the 4-day event brings together
prominent activists, both public and private, who are actively attempting to
have capital punishment banned across the globe.
Among those voicing their concern for the plight of the religious minorities
was Audun Halvorsen, the State Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of
Norway, who said that “even in 2019, people can be sentenced to death because
of who they love, because of their faith, their sexual orientation. This is not
acceptable.”
The congress heard that support for the death penalty was lowest among Hispanic
(24%) and Black Protestants (25%), 68% of each preferred handing out life
sentences without the chance of parole. The two communities’ views on capital
punishment were backed by their fellow Christians in the Catholic Church, as
well as by Jews, other non-Christian religions, and those who identify as
religiously unaffiliated.
Pope Francis has spoken more forcibly about the issue, saying that life
imprisonment is a form of torture and “a hidden (form of the) death penalty”.
The Holy See’s abhorrence of the capital punishment is rooted in the Catechism
of the Catholic Church, which proclaims that “in the light of the Gospel” the
death penalty is “an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person”.
Religious faith and capital punishment have always been intertwined.
Christianity’s primordial event was the execution of its founder, and the same
fate was suffered by many of its early teachers.
At the same time, putting “wrong thinkers” to death has generally been
presented – and remains to be – a sacred necessity that began with the
Inquisition in 15th century Europe and continues to this day through the
actions of terrorist groups and radical Islamist movements that include ISIS,
Boko Haram, and the Afghan Taliban.
(source: neweurope.eu)
******************************
Belarus attending 7th World Congress against Death Penalty
Belarus' Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Oleg Kravchenko is in Brussels,
Belgium on a visit from 27 February to 1 March to take part in the 7th World
Congress against the Death Penalty, BelTA learned from the Belarusian Ministry
of Foreign Affairs.
“On 28 February, the deputy minister attended a side event on the death penalty
in Belarus. Chairman of the Standing Committee on Human Rights, National
Relations and Media of the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of
Belarus Andrei Naumovich shared the country's position on the work of the
parliamentary working group studying death penalty as an instrument of
punishment, and also scheduled events and interaction with international
partners on the matter,” the press service of the ministry said.
While in Brussels, Oleg Kravchenko and Belarus' Permanent Representative to the
EU Alexander Mikhnevich met with Secretary General of the European External
Action Service (EEAS) Helga Schmid and EEAS Managing Director Thomas
Mayr-Harting to discuss relations between Belarus and the European Union,
outline plans for future joint events.
Together with MP Andrei Naumovich, the deputy minister of foreign affairs held
talks with Raphael Chenuil-Hazan, Director of the NGO Together against the
Death Penalty, and representatives of the Council of Europe.
The parties talked over Belarus' cooperation with the abovementioned
organizations. Oleg Kravchenko is expected to meet with Executive Director of
the European Institute of Peace Michael Keating and Belgian MP Pol Van Den
Driessche.
(source: eng.belta.by)
INDONESIA:
Life on death row: British grandmother awaits firing squad
Chatty, cheerful and brimming with mischievous gossip, Lindsay Sandiford sits
cross-legged, knitting a pink baby blanket, and talks affectionately about her
sons and the granddaughters she dotes on, whose faces smile out from pictures
stuck on the walls around her bed.
"They are a joy - a real joy," she beams, gazing at the photos of the young
cousins, aged one and six. "The younger one is marvellously bonkers. She's such
a character. If I was to die tomorrow, I would be happy I've had that
relationship with them. It is the most important thing in my life."
What might sound like a melodramatic slice of whimsy from an indulgent
grandparent has a darker resonance when spoken by 62-year-old Sandiford, who
sits knitting while on death row, in Indonesia. She could be taken to face the
firing squad at any time.
Sandiford, from Yorkshire in Britain, was sentenced to death in 2013 for
smuggling 10lb of cocaine from Bangkok to Bali and has spent the past six years
in a 5-metre-by-5-metre cell with 4 other women in the island's notorious
Kerobokan prison, ironically nicknamed Hotel K.
2 friends from her time in jail have been taken away in the dead of the night
to be executed and she knows that, at 72 hours' notice, she could be taken
under armed escort to Nusa Kambangan, the country's execution island, 700km
away, on the southern coast of Central Java.
A legal-cost draftsman in Cheltenham before she separated from her husband and
moved to India, Sandiford was arrested as she arrived in Bali in 2012, carrying
a suitcase with a false bottom stuffed with the illicit drug that fuels the
holiday island's manic nightlife. The unlikeliest of mules, she had no previous
convictions and claims she only agreed to meet syndicate members in Bangkok and
take the suitcase to Bali after the Britain-based drugs gang threatened to kill
her younger son if she refused.
Sandiford says she had been snared by the syndicate while she was living
overseas and her sons, who were running wild in her absence, crossed swords
with a drugs gang operating out of London and Brighton.
She was interrogated for 48 hours and at one point says she had a gun held
against her head.
"I said, 'Go on. Pull the trigger,' and the officer kicked the chair beside me
away," she recalls. "There was a tremendous bang and I thought, 'That's it -
he's shot me.' I will never forget that man's face and he is always in my
nightmares."
Eventually, she agreed to help police catch the syndicate members to whom she
was delivering the cocaine and took part in a sting operation that saw three
British expatriates living on Bail arrested for drug trafficking. Sandiford
says she was promised leniency in return for helping with the arrests and even
fancifully believed she might be freed and sent home. It soon became clear,
however, that her ordeal had only just started.
She found herself locked up in Bali's Polda police station alongside the
syndicate members she had set up for arrest - Julian Ponder, Paul Beales and
Ponder's then-partner, Rachel Dougall - who, Sandiford says, "told me my kids
were dead and I'd be next".
In the months leading up to their trials, Sandiford railed bitterly against the
injustice she felt she had suffered and struggled to find a lawyer to navigate
Indonesia's notoriously arcane judicial system. Ponder, Beales and Dougall, by
contrast, kept a low profile as bribes of more than HK$10 million (S$1.7
million) were rumoured to have been paid on their behalf.
When the cases came to court, Sandiford was tried for drug trafficking while
the loss of vital evidence meant the other three Britons faced reduced charges.
Sandiford was sentenced to death, the only woman to ever have received the
penalty for drug offences in Bali, despite a recommendation from the prosecutor
that she serve a term of 15 years. Ponder was sentenced to 6 years and Beales
to four years for drug possession, while Dougall walked free after a year, for
failing to report a crime.
6 years on, Ponder - once known as the King of Bali for his lavish lifestyle
and unexplained wealth during his 8 years on the island - is flitting between
luxury hotels in Malaysia and Thailand and has a baby with a 23-year-old Asian
wife he met inside Kerobokan, where she was serving a sentence for fraud.
Sandiford has refused consular assistance after, in an astonishing twist, the
British vice-consul to Bali, married mother-of-2 Alys Harahap, was dismissed in
2015, having been accused of conducting an illicit romance with Ponder during
her official visits to Kerobokan. To make her plight worse, more than
HK$400,000 raised by church groups and well-wishers for a final appeal against
Sandiford's death penalty has been stolen by an Indonesian lawyer and legal
assistant hired to challenge her sentence, both of whom have proved impossible
to track down.
An outcry over Sandiford's sentence from overseas human rights lawyers and
former British director of public prosecutions Ken Macdonald, who argued that
she had been treated with "quite extraordinary severity", has failed to get
Sandiford taken off death row. Macdonald argued that there were "compelling
reasons" to overturn her sentence, and said, "It is very difficult to catch
anyone other than mules because they are the ones who put themselves on the
line. Unless they co-operate, the chances of catching those higher up the chain
tend to be slender. But who will co-operate in Indonesia in the future if the
prospect is the death sentence?"
The British government has nevertheless refused to fund Sandiford's appeal,
despite being urged to consider doing so by the Supreme Court in London, whose
five-judge panel ruled that "substantial mitigating factors" had been
overlooked in her original trial.
6 years on death row have left Sandiford a calmer, more sanguine character than
the woman arrested in 2012. In a series of meetings in January and February, an
hour at a time spent in a stiflingly hot caged enclosure at the entrance to the
women's section of Kerobokan, she makes it clear that she is reconciled to her
situation.
"I really cannot face asking anyone for help or having to deal with another
lawyer. I've been burnt enough times," she says. "I've had 10 different
lawyers. I've had one steal all my money. If I actually turned my mind to the
legal process, I would get angry and bitter and it would be destructive."
Neither does she want the British government to belatedly intervene. "If they
started getting involved, they would probably end up getting me shot even
sooner," she says. Her last contact from any British official was a letter from
new vice-consul John Makin, in October 2016, asking her to contact him if she
wanted assistance. Sandiford did not reply.
"I have days when I feel miserable and I think I do have an underlying
depression, but I try not to let it take over my life or what time I have left,
or whether it ends with a bullet. It's destructive to dwell on it, which is why
I've kept busy to stay positive," she says. "You can either focus on the
negative or the positive and wallowing in misery doesn't get you anywhere
except being more miserable.
"In spite of everything, I feel blessed. I have been blessed to live long
enough to see my 2 sons grow up into fine young men and blessed to have been
able to meet my 2 grandchildren.
"I do feel I can cope with it now. Execution won't be a hard thing for me to
face any more. It's not particularly a death I would choose but, then again, I
wouldn't choose dying in agony from cancer either.
"I had a friend from Scotland who died of breast cancer in Hawaii in the late
1990s. I was there when she died. She was only 44 and had her children fairly
late, and they were 5 and 6 years old. The last thing she did was hold my hand
and sing Mele Kalikimaka to me, which is Hawaiian for Merry Christmas. She
never got to see her children grow up and she never got to hold her
grandchildren. So when I think of her I realise I haven't got anything to
complain about."
Sandiford has seen both of her granddaughters in Bali - the 1-year-old visited
with her parents for the 1st time in November - and she is able to make
occasional phone and video calls to her children and grandchildren in Britain.
"What keeps me going is the fact I have seen my boys become men and become
fathers and I have 2 beautiful granddaughters," she says. "I wake up and I see
their faces and I smile. I am sad I can't be a full-time grandmother but I have
lived long enough to meet them and hold them and tell them that I love them.
"Even if I have a really bad day here, I turn around in bed and see my
grandchildren. I wake up and I look at their faces and I'm not religious but I
honestly feel blessed. I regret I haven't been of more help to my boys, but I
don't think they would be at the point they are in their lives if I wasn't in
here. They wouldn't have grown up as much if I was there as a safety net for
them. My sons are both doing incredibly well and they both want to seize life
rather than waste it and watch it drift away in a haze of smoke."
Now grey-haired and suffering from arthritis, Sandiford has difficulty walking.
She spends most of each day in her cell and jokingly admits the biggest issue
affecting her execution may be the half-mile "walk of death" prisoners have to
take to reach the forest clearing where the shootings - up to a dozen
condemned prisoners executed at the same time - are carried out. For Sandiford,
though, the most appalling element of execution is not the mechanics of death
but the process that precedes it.
"What I am uncomfortable about is the public humiliation. You're dragged
halfway around the country and paraded in front of the press before being
executed. My attitude is: if you want to shoot me, shoot me. Get on with it.
I've done a terrible thing, I know, but the worst thing is the ritual public
humiliation they seem to enjoy."
She was close friends with Andrew Chan and Myuran (Myu) Sukumaran, members of
the Bali Nine Australian drug-smuggling gang, who were taken from Kerobokan to
be executed in April 2015. The loss of Chan, who spent 10 years on death row in
Kerobokan and became a Christian minister before his death, at the age of 31,
hit her particularly hard.
"I had a message from Andrew just after midnight on the day he was taken away
saying, 'They're coming.' There were tanks rumbling outside the prison at 4am
and that was just horrible. I got 7 letters from Andrew while he was on Nusa
Kambangan, before they executed him. He used to call me the Blue Whale because
of the outfit I wore. He was funny. I still miss him."
Sandiford has the right to a final visit from her family before her execution
and to have a spiritual adviser accompany her to the firing squad but insists
she wants neither.
"I can't be dealing with other people and having to make them feel all right
about it. I don't want any fuss at all," she says. "I do not want my family to
go through what Andrew and Myu's families went through and the other families
who were there. I've told my family, 'If you come, I will refuse to see you, so
don't bother coming.'
"I've told them that when I'm dead there will be no ceremonies, no nothing. If
there's any money left, spend it all in one day and have a party and enjoy
yourselves. I've told them, 'If there's any weeping or ritual trees or flowers
I will come back and haunt you.'
"I'm their mum and they love me and for me that's enough. And they know I love
them and hopefully that will be enough for them."
Asked how she imagines she will handle the process of execution when the moment
comes, she replies, "I should think I will be quite cantankerous and
non-compliant" before breaking into raucous laughter.
The only prisoner awaiting execution in Kerobokan, Sandiford passes her days
knitting in her cell and teaching other prisoners how to knit. They produce
hundreds of beautifully crafted toys and clothes that are sold to raise money
for charities and church groups, and for work to improve conditions on the
women's block, which is overcrowded and has poor sewage and drainage, she
says. On her block, more than 250 prisoners are crammed into the cells, some
containing more than a dozen women, others just one. Inmates have to buy and
prepare their own food, which they cook in a basic, chaotic kitchen area at the
end of the building.
"I can't just sit here feeling miserable and sorry for myself, so I get on with
what I like doing," says Sandiford. "I like knitting and I like cooking, so I
knit and I cook. I've always got a project on the go. At the moment, I'm
knitting 100 woollen pigs for a charity - I've got 10 girls working on it.
"I like knitting and I never had time for it before, when I was raising two
kids. It's therapeutic. They've started knitting in a lot of North American
prisons because it's rhythmic and you're counting and you can't really think
about anything else when you're counting, and it stops you feeling sorry for
yourself, although, I must admit, I do have the odd day when I wallow in
self-pity."
It is evident that Sandiford enjoys a warm relationship with the guards.
"My philosophy is they can't make my life any more miserable so if I don't want
to do something, I tell them I won't do it and I ask them, 'What are you going
to do about it? Shoot me?' And they just laugh and walk off," she says. "They
are really, really good to me. They feel incredibly sorry for me. They know who
I am. They know I don't cause a problem. They know I'm not out there fighting
and I don't gossip or get involved in arguments. I don't complain about
anything and they leave me alone."
Many of the women in Kerobokan are Indonesians who were driven into drug
trafficking by poverty.
"They get horrendous sentences," says Sandiford. "There's one girl in here
who's 24 and she got 12 years for having 30 grams of crystal meth. Another girl
is 20 and she was sentenced to 20 years for less than a kilo of crystal meth. A
kilo would have got her the death sentence.
"I try to help foreign girls because they've got no one else here to help them.
Today, I made pumpkin soup and I made a great big cauldron and gave some to the
Filipino girls and some to the Thai girls and some to the African girls."
She insists she rarely gives a thought to Ponder and the other members of the
syndicate who are now free while she remains on death row.
"If I dwelt on it I could quite easily send myself insane with the unfairness
of it all. But it is what it is. You can bash your head against a wall but it
isn't going to change the situation I'm in," she says.
Post Magazine traced Ponder to a hotel in Kuala Lumpur, where he was staying on
undefined business with his young wife and baby daughter. He declined to
comment but told a friend he hoped Sandiford was spared execution, saying,
"Lying awake every night for so many years thinking you could be taken away and
executed at any time is already punishment enough."
A British diplomatic source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Sandiford
had refused consular support since 2014 but that, "We are ready to begin
providing it again if she changes her mind."
No official representations have been made by the British government on
Sandiford's behalf since her case was raised by then-foreign secretary William
Hague on a visit to Jakarta, in 2014, but a Foreign Office spokesman says, "We
have repeatedly made representations about the use of the death penalty to the
Indonesian government at the highest levels."
Indonesia has not executed a foreign national since 2016, when it sent three
Nigerians to the firing squad, but it has not announced a moratorium. Popular
with voters, executions are often conducted for political reasons and may
resume following the presidential election, in April.
Back in Kerobokan, Sandiford has decided to get on with however much life she
has left.
"We're all in jail," she reasons. "It's a planet and you can't get off it. It's
just that your corner of it is a bit more open than mine.
"The one thing certain about life is no one gets out alive."
With that, she goes back to her knitting.
(source: asiaone.com)
SOUTH SUDAN----executions
7 men including members of one family hanged amid spike in executions
South Sudan authorities executed at least 7 people in February 2019 alone, 3 of
whom were from the same family. This is as many as were executed in the whole
of 2018 and represents a shocking spike in the use of the death penalty in the
country, Amnesty International said today.
“This confirms our fears that South Sudan authorities have absolutely no
respect for the right to life as they continue to totally disregard the fact
that the world is moving away from use of the death penalty,” said Seif
Magango, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for East Africa, the Horn and
the Great Lakes.
In December 2018, Amnesty International raised the alarm that the eastern
African country had in that year executed more people than in any other year
since its independence in 2011.
The executions in 2018 followed the transfer of at least 135 death row
prisoners from county and state prisons to Wau Central Prison and Juba Central
Prison, which are equipped with gallows to carry out executions.
6 of this year’s victims were executed in Juba Central Prison, while at least 1
was executed in Wau Central Prison. All the victims were men. The country
executes people by hanging.
“We are shocked and dismayed that executions have become the order of the day
in South Sudan. Rather than execute people, the authorities should rehabilitate
prisoners and make them well-adjusted individuals that can contribute
positively to society,” said Seif Magango.
Amnesty International has established that at least three of the executions
undertaken in February 2019 were shrouded in secrecy; the family of the 3
related men was not informed of their impending execution and only learnt of
the death of their loved ones after they had been executed.
“These reports are extremely concerning, and we cannot even begin to imagine
how the families must be feeling. South Sudan must immediately commute all
death sentences to terms of imprisonment, establish an official moratorium on
executions and take steps, without delay, to abolish the death penalty,” said
Seif Magango.
Amnesty International established that at least four of the seven executed men
had been convicted of murder. The country’s Penal Code also allows for the use
of the death penalty for bearing false witness resulting in an innocent
person’s execution, terrorism (or banditry, insurgency or sabotage) resulting
in death, aggravated drug trafficking and treason.
Background
Amnesty International opposes the death penalty in all cases without exception
regardless of the nature of the crime, the characteristics of the offender, or
the method used by the state to execute the prisoner.
The death penalty - the premeditated and cold-blooded killing of a human being
by the state in the name of justice - is the most fundamental denial of human
rights. It violates the right to life as proclaimed in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights. It is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading
punishment.
(source: Amnesty International)
*******************
Executions Stepped Up in War-Ravaged South Sudan, Amnesty Says
South Sudan is stepping up its use of executions, hanging seven people in the
first 2 months of 2019, the same number subjected to the death penalty all of
last year, Amnesty International said.
6 were executed at a prison in the capital, Juba, and at least 1 other was in
Wau, in the country’s northwest, the London-based advocacy group said Friday in
a statement. 4 had been convicted of murder, while 3 belonged to the same
family and their executions were “shrouded in secrecy,” with relatives only
being informed after their deaths.
“This confirms our fears that South Sudan authorities have absolutely no
respect for the right to life as they continue to totally disregard the fact
that the world is moving away from use of the death penalty,” said Seif
Magango, Amnesty’s deputy director for East Africa.
South Sudan, Africa’s youngest country, is trying to emerge from a 5-year civil
war that may have claimed almost 400,000 lives. Amnesty declined to give more
information about the executions. Government spokesmen didn’t answer multiple
calls seeking comment.
(source: Bloomberg News)
PHILIPPINES/SAUDI ARABIA:
DFA moving to save Filipina on death row in Saudi
The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) on Friday said it is exhausting all
“diplomatic avenues and legal remedies” to save a Filipina sentenced with death
penalty in Saudi Arabia.
“The Philippine Consulate General in Jeddah said it will continue to assist the
Filipina who was sentenced to death in 2017 for murdering her female employer
in Makkah 3 years ago,” the DFA said in a statement.
The Saudi Court of Appeals affirmed the Filipina’s death sentence on Thursday.
The OFW had told the court that she killed her employer in self defense.
Consul General Edgar Badajos claimed that the Consulate has been assisting the
Filipina since the start of her trial by providing her with a lawyer and
sending a representative to attend the hearings.
Badajos also said that the Filipina’s case has been referred to the Department
of Justice, which is serving as chair of the Inter-Agency Committee Against
Trafficking (IACAT), for the filing of appropriate charges against the
recruiters of the OFW, who was just a minor when she was first deployed to
Saudi Arabia in 2016.
(source: globalnation.inquirer.net)
KENYA:
Man sentenced to death for defilement and murder
A 25-year-old man has been sentenced to death for defiling and killing a
14-year-old girl.
Charles Langat, who worked for the minor's aunt as a herdsman, committed the
offences on December 13, 2015, in Londiani.
The victim had attended a Mass at St Barnabas Catholic Church at Kamuingi as
her mother and aunt went to Kenya Assemblies of God.
The victim returned before her mother and aunt. Langat had been home the whole
day.
When the minor's aunt and mother returned at 2pm, the girl was nowhere to be
seen and Langat was also missing.
They waited for Langat and the minor to return but to no avail. The victim's
mother found her body in the evening as she drove cattle into the shed.
"When she opened the door to the sheep's pen, she found the deceased on the
ground with no underpants and covered in blood,” the prosecutor, Susan Keli,
told Justice Mumbi Ngugi.
Sharp object
“The stomach injuries and the injuries to the scalp could have been caused by a
sharp object. The hymen, which was freshly torn, would have been due to
penetration by a male sexual organ and any other blunt object,” said a
postmortem report by George Biketi, a senior Nakuru County medical officer.
"We also found semen in the minor's vagina. She also had a stab wound extending
from the spleen, the stomach, the omentum and liver."
Henry Sang, from the Government Chemist, said: “Our analysis concluded the DNA
profiles from the knife and the pair of trousers matched those generated from
the victim's blood sample."
Justice Mumbi said: “The accused defiled the victim, stabbed her brutally and
then carried her body into the sheep’s pen where he dumped it. This was a clear
case of murder. I find that the accused deserves the death penalty. I therefore
sentence him to death." Langat has 14 days to appeal.
(source: standardmedia.co.ke)
FRANCE/IRAQ:
France Will Intervene if ISIS Fighter Citizens Sentenced to Death in Iraq
France’s Minister of Justice has announced that the government will intervene
should French Islamic State members be sentenced to death in Iraq for their
activities.
13 French Islamic State fighters face trial in Iraq after being captured in
Syria and under Iraqi law, the penalty for anyone caught providing material aid
to Islamic State or other extremist organisations is death, Le Parisien
reports.
Justice Minister Nicole Belloubet said that the French would allow the Iraqis
to judge the foreign fighters but would insist on imposing a limit which would
not allow the use of the death penalty.
” There are French adults who have knowingly gone on the battlefield, it is not
illogical that they are responsible for their actions where they committed
them,” Belloubet said.
“We are on the one hand ensuring that the rights of defence are ensured and on
the other hand the French who are entitled to consular protection. We,
therefore, will ensure the minimum of respect for the right to a fair trial,”
she added.
The upcoming trials are just the latest of foreign fighters from Europe. Last
year, the Iraqi courts sentenced French national Melina Boughedir to life in
prison for being a member of Islamic State.
During the trial, the 27-year-old’s lawyers complained that the French
government had worked proactively to stop her and other jihadists from
returning to France.
Earlier this month, authorities revealed that France could be looking at
hundreds of possible returning Islamic State members with the state services
estimating there could be as many as 300 men, 300 women, and 500 children
waiting to be repatriated.
Germany’s Linda Wenzel was also put on trial for joining the Islamic State by
Iraqi authorities and was sentenced to 6 years in prison for various charges
including entering the country illegally to join the terror group.
(source: breitbart.com)
MOROCCO:
Justice Minister: Royal Pardons Effectively Reduce Death Sentences----A
congress is meeting in Brussels to encourage countries to abolish the death
penalty, arguing it does not prevent crime.
Moroccan Minister of Justice Mohamed Aujjar has highlighted Morocco’s
“realistic” approach of enshrining the right to life in the Constitution while
speaking in Brussels at the seventh World Congress against the Death Penalty.
Speaking at the opening of the congress, which started on February 26 and runs
until March 1, at the European Parliament headquarters, Aujjar said that
although the open debate on the death penalty in Morocco has not yet been
decided, Morocco did have the courage to include the right to life in the 2011
Constitution.
He explained that Article 20 stipulates that “the right to life is the first
right of every human being.” He added that the government has not reached a
consensus on the death penalty but stressed that Morocco has not carried out an
execution since 1993.
Aujjar noted that the government’s policy is to limit death penalty sentences
to a few crimes, such as crimes against humanity, war crimes, and genocide.
However, in December, a Moroccan named Ilyas El Koraichi called for Morocco to
give the death penalty to the suspects arrested for the killing of 2
Scandinavian tourists on December 17. El Koraichi created the petition on
Change.org, and it has received 2,207 signatures so far.
Aujjar highlighted the effectiveness of royal pardons to reduce the number of
people on death row by converting death sentences to limited prison terms.
The Moroccan official expressed optimism that Morocco’s current efforts, with
the dynamism of civil society, will lead the debate to a consensus on the death
penalty.
The president of the National Council of Human Rights (CNDH), Amina Bouayach,
who also attended the congress, told Maghreb Arab Press (MAP) that CNDH has
demanded the abolition of the death penalty and emphasized that the right to
life is a basic right that the justice system must guarantee.
The congress was attended by the high representative of the EU, Federica
Mogherini; Belgian Minister of Foreign Affairs Didier Reynders; European
deputies; and representatives of governments and civil society organizations.
The speakers unanimously underlined the importance of advocating for a
universal abolition of the death penalty and defending the right to life,
arguing that the death penalty does not prevent crime.
The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, and Pope Francis
also expressed their support for an end to the death penalty in messages
broadcasted via a video call.
(source: Morocco World News)
EGYPT:
EU Parliament vice president admits 'hypocrisy' on Egypt executions
While the EU is under heavy criticisms for its "deafening silence" over the
executions in Egypt, Vice President of the European Parliament, Pavel Telicka,
said "Aren't we, in the EU, sometimes hypocritical? Yes, we are. It's a matter
of fact. We are imperfect, yet in terms of human rights and on the question of
the death penalty, the EU has a record that no one in the world has, but we are
not a world policeman." Telicka's comments came after a question raised during
the 7th World Congress Against the Death Penalty held at the European
Parliament in Brussels. Telicka said he has recently met with an Egyptian
minister where he raised concerns on human rights and asked for a visit to
Egypt.
"So far that did not have a follow-up. I regret to say, it takes two to dance
the tango. Having said that, I need to also eventually admit that not everyone
in the EU is always 100 percent pursuing that [humanitarian] policy." Telicka
pointed at the U.N. for the issue and said the EU should also step up its
efforts. "For sure, we can always do better."
Belgian Foreign Minister Didier Reynders, who also attended to the event,
responded to a question on European leaders attending a summit in Egypt just
after the execution of nine men. Reynders said that they are holding bilateral
talks with Egyptian authorities on the matter. "There are two different
elements, the way to go to the abolition of the death penalty which is a [EU]
principle and the other way is to discuss the conditions of prosecution and the
application of death penalty."
Last week Egyptian authorities executed 9 young men convicted of assassinating
an Egyptian prosecutor-general in 2015 in a car bombing. Amnesty International
said the men were convicted on terrorism charges after "grossly unfair trials"
marred by torture. U.N. human rights spokesman Rupert Colville told a briefing
in Geneva, that "there is significant cause for concern that due process and
fair trial guarantees may not have been followed in some or all of these cases,
and that the very serious allegations concerning the use of torture were not
properly investigated." European leaders attended the two-day EU-Arab summit in
the Egyptian resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh, a few days after the execution.
Following the summit, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker posted
a tweet in which he said he is "grateful" to Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah
el-Sissi for hosting the summit. The EU Commission, EU Council and the EU
Parliament have not yet commented on the 15 political executions that took
place in Egypt in the past month.
(source: dailysabah.com)
_______________________________________________
A service courtesy of Washburn University School of Law www.washburnlaw.edu
DeathPenalty mailing list
DeathPenalty@lists.washlaw.edu
http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/listinfo/deathpenalty
Unsubscribe: http://lists.washlaw.edu/mailman/options/deathpenalty
