Aug. 1
SCOTLAND/PAKISTAN:
Scottish lawyer fight for the rights of the innocents on death row in Pakistan
Becoming interested in Pakistan as a student, lawyer Isabel Buchanan moved to
the country those condemned to death row.
When Isabel Buchanan was a student in Glasgow, she had a passion for gulab
jamun, a sticky sweet pudding sold by her local Pakistani newsagent Mr Ali.
It was the beginning of her fascination with Pakistan, a country in which she
would later devote herself to the condemned of death row.
In 2011, Isabel, then a 23 year-old lawyer moved to Pakistan to work as an
intern in a legal chambers in Lahore, as part of small defence team fighting
for innocent men facing execution.
This week saw the publication of Isabel's new book, Trials - On Death Row in
Pakistan, in which she recounts her time working for the underfunded and
understaffed fledgling firm Justice Project Pakistan (JPP).
In a unusual step, the firm was founded by a woman, the doggedly determined
Pakistani lawyer Sarah Belal.
Soon after her graduation from Glasgow University, Isabel volunteered with a
legal charity in London, where she worked solely on the cases of British
citizens on death row in Pakistan.
Much of the work was in Birmingham and the Midlands which has a concentration
of Pakistanis.
Matter of fact, she states: "It was during the course of these trips to the
Midlands that I decided to learn Urdu, move to Pakistan and work in Lahore.
"This seemed to me an un-complicatedly good thing to do; the one thing I did
know was that I was anti-death penalty."
Pakistan has the largest recorded death row population in the world, with more
than 8,000 inmates incarcerated in jails across the country, some awaiting
execution for more than 20 years.
The move to Pakistan was an enormous step for a young woman from Edinburgh,
whose only experience of the country was a student, absorbing the culture of
the Pakistanis who lived around her in the south side of Glasgow.
She said: "Another Pakistan was local to me. Glasgow has a large British
Pakistani population. Many of our city councillors, neighbours, news agents and
restaurateurs were of Pakistani heritage. And greed was my way into this world.
For 4 undergraduate years, my favourite puddings were the gulab jamun."
There are more than 20 British citizens in Pakistan's death row.
A large number of Pakistani-born citizens own land in Pakistan and find
themselves being caught up in territory disputes and being targeted as a result
of jealousy.
Isabel said expat Pakistanis visiting the country are "easily framed as guilty
parties".
The JPP is one of the few firms in Pakistan willing to take on blasphemy cases,
since many of those who have, were targets of assassination.
Isabel said: "There are a number of very high-profile instances of lawyers
being assassinated by people walking into their office and simply shooting them
at point-blank range. Or those who are outspoken being assassinated in other
ways. It has a real chastening effect."
As an intern, Isabel herself was not directly threatened but she did fear for
Sarah who became a close friend.
She said: "There remain all the risks of being in the wrong place at the wrong
time; quite apart from working on these legal cases, Pakistan itself is not the
most stable of countries. I worried about Sarah a bit, but I wasn't at the
forefront of anything."
During Isabel's period at the JPP, there had been a lengthy moratorium on the
death penalty but it was lifted in the aftermath of the Peshawar massacre when
more than 150 people, all but nine of them children, died in a Taliban attack
on an Army Public school.
Until then the JPP had been fighting for the freedom of the death row's
forgotten inmates, 66 % of whom Pakistan's former minister for human rights,
believed to be innocent.
Torture is often used by police to elicit unreliable convictions.
Isabel lists common techniques as "sleep deprivation, heat exposure, rolling
heavy objects over a person???s limbs, beatings with a leather racket,
attaching electrodes to a person's genitals and running a current through
them".
She said: "After days drifting in and out of consciousness, delirious with
pain, heat, thirst and hunger, few can remember what they've confessed to, or
how exactly their confessions were induced."
Since late 2014 there have been over 400 executions and Zulfikar Alki Khan,
Sarah's 1st death row case, was among them.
Khan was executed for murder but there was considerable evidence that he had
acted in self defence.
Isabel had also worked on the case and the essential professional detachment
that the JPP lawyers must employ was replaced by grief when Khan was hanged.
Isabel said: "It is impossible to prepare for the feeling of having a client
executed. When Zulifikar Ali Khan was hanged it hit horribly. There was all the
incomprehension and sadness of death, coloured by a desperate feeling of
failure and responsibilty.
"When you're working on the cases, your job is not to be sad, your job is to do
everything you can to overturn the sentence or get some point on which the
death penalty can be rescinded. But the really difficult stage is in those last
few hours and the hours afterwards, when there is actually absolutely nothing
you can do or it's already happened.
"At that point it's impossible to escape the horror of it and also it feels
right to embrace that sadness, because it becomes a sign of respect, rather
than you shirking your duties as a lawyer."
Despite the risk to her life, Sarah has continued the fight in Pakistan and the
firm she founded has now expanded.
Isabel continued to work on the death row cases from 2011, often returning to
Pakistan, a country she grew to love deeply.
She is now training to be a barrister in London.
She said: "Now even a late night in chambers when you are making yourself a cup
of tea at 2am and have just bought some sushi, looks pretty cosy compared to
writing the final-day application at 2am in Lahore where it's 50C and you've
got no AC and someone's threatening to kill your boss. It's good to have that
perspective."
(source: dailyrecord.co.uk)
UGANDA:
Muslim Clerics Ask Katureeba to Set Court Rules For Their Trial
Jailed Muslim clerics have asked Chief Justice Bart Katureebe to intervene and
administratively streamline the rules of procedure governing the International
Crimes Division (ICD) of the High Court.
A group of 31 suspects including Sheikh Yunus Kamoga, the remanded leader of
the Tabliq sect and alleged mastermind of the killing of top Muslim clerics,
cited contradictions and disharmony in the rules and procedure of the court
established as a War Crimes Division in 2008.
The suspects are being tried for, among others, alleged crimes against
humanity, murder, attempted murder, terrorism and aiding and rendering support
to the Allied Democratic Front (ADF) rebel group.
"... our (main) concern is that the current proceedings against our clients and
the others on the same indictment will make it impossible for the trial of the
international crimes to be conducted in accordance with international law or in
the least, it may be impossible for the court to try international or local
crimes on the same indictment using the same or different rules," a July 28
letter to Chief Justice Katureebe signed on behalf of the suspects by their
lawyer, Muwema and company Advocates, reads in part.
They contend that the uncertainties will not only affect court's ability to
dispense justice in a lawful and uniform manner but it will also jeopardise
their preparation for defence, thereby undermining their fundamental rights to
a fair hearing.
"This will render the whole proceedings a nullity," adds the letter.
According to the letter, Uganda appears to be departing from the position of
the international law and provisions of the Rome Statute, established the
International Criminal Court, because the court is handling cases in a manner
which defeats the purpose of the existing laws.
"One of the significant differences between the 2 is that the trial of
international crimes must be preceded by a pre-trial where based on the weight
of evidence in the summary, the charges are either confirmed or dismissed at
the stage. This procedure is not available to domestic criminal trials," they
said. The suspects' lawyers contend that the rules introduce death penalty
which is not provided in proceedings for an international crime by allowing
that crime to be tried on the same indictment with a local crime like murder
and terrorism which carry death sentence.
"...the issue we are raising affects delivery of justice by the court in a
substantial way. Without clear rules of procedure, justice can neither be done
nor be seen to be done," reads the letter, adding it is not possible to know
which rules prevail or should be applied.
A panel of 3 judges led by Ezekiel Muhanguzi set August 9 to enable the
prosecution to get a copy of the rules that govern the court before actual
trial can commence. Other judges are Jane Kiggundu and Percy Tuhaise.
(source: The Monitor)
NIGERIA:
Death is the legitimate punishment for the Zaria Massacre
As a Retentionist status nation, Nigeria retains the death penalty. The
punishment for the massacre of over 350 Nigerians in 2 days, and the subsequent
secret burial of these victims with many not medically confirmed dead, can only
be capital: death.
This is what is ordained in the Holy Bible, this is what obtains in the Holy
Quran and this is what obtains according to the Nigerian constitution and
Nigerian Armed Forces Act.
As the Kaduna Judicial Panel report is being edited for release, one can only
expect such a recommendation for an expedient death sentence to all found
guilty, in the report and subsequent Whitepaper under the freshly commissioned
nine-member Adamu Mohammed Mansur led panel.
The Nigerian constitution recommends the death penalty for acts of treason,
homicide and armed robbery.
The Nigerian Armed Forces Act
Part XII, 106, under "Murder," defines:
A person subject to service law under this Act who, without justification or
excuse, unlawfully kills another person whether or not subject to service law
under this Act when-
(a) he intends to cause the death of the person killed or that of any other
person; or
(b) he intends to do the person killed or to any other person some grievous
harm; or
(c) death is caused by means of an act done in the prosecution of an unlawful
purpose, where the act is of a nature that is likely to endanger human life, is
guilty of murder and liable, on conviction by a court-martial, to suffer death.
Further for the cases of incendiarism during the Decsmber 12th to 14th Zaria
massacre, part 111. of theNigerian Armed Forces Act under caption "Arson"
defines:
"A person subject to service law under this Act who wilfully or maliciously
sets fire-
(a) to a public building, dwelling house, an office or any structure
whatsoever, movable or immovable, whether completed or not, occupied or not; or
is guilty of arson and liable, on conviction by a court-martial, to
imprisonment for life.
Recently the Nigerian army sentenced several officers to death for the offense
of mutiny which falls into the capital offenses category according to the Armed
Forces Act.
Many of the Zaria victims remain burned beyond recognition from the
incendiarism of the two days of the massacre, and in serious anguish and
suffering. The pain to the victims and their families and orphaned children is
beyond words. The massacre of the hundreds of innocent Nigerians in Zaria last
December has been described as the record state-perpetrator act of terror and
genocide in recent global history.
While Nigeria's army chief Tukur Yusuf Buratai, defended the actions of the
army and general's in charge in the 2 days of the December massacre and claimed
the army acted according to its rules of engagement, RoE, further claiming in
his deposition to the Nigerian Human Rights Commission, NHRC, that only seven
(7) minority Muslims of the Islamic movement were killed in the fracas, the
Kaduna panel of inquiry received evidence from the Kaduna state government of
the army submitting over 350 bodies for secret burial, thereby finding the army
chief complicit and in attempt to obstruct and subvert justice. The
recommendations of the panel in lieu of this are yet to be revealed as the full
report is yet to be made public.
For the massacre of hundreds of people, Nigerians expect justice to sanctify
and purify the land, and death sentences are requisite justice for such an
unwarranted and evil genocide.
(source: news24.com.ng)
UNITED NATIONS:
UN chief bucks capital punishment
The United Nations human rights chief is opposing the imposition of capital
punishment in all circumstances, saying death penalty is "not an effective
deterrent" to crime and does not protect people from drug abuse.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein was reacting to the
execution of four convicted drug traffickers in Indonesia last Friday.
Convicted Filipina drug trafficker Mary Jane Veloso was spared because the
Philippine government under former president Benigno Aquino III asked that she
be allowed to testify against Maria Kristina Sergio, who allegedly recruited
her and tricked her into smuggling 2.6 kg of heroin into Indonesia.
But the new Philippine administration under President Duterte has expressed
conviction that death penalty can be used to stop illegal drug trade in the
country.
Al Hussein said the focus of drug-related crime prevention should involve
strengthening the justice system to make it more effective.
He also called on authorities of "the most prolific executioner" in Southeast
Asia to immediately reinstate a moratorium on the death penalty.
"The increasing use of the death penalty in Indonesia is terribly worrying, and
I urge the government to immediately end this practice which is unjust and
incompatible with human rights," he said.
"I find it deeply disturbing that Indonesia has already executed 19 people
since 2013, making it the most prolific executioner in Southeast Asia," he
added.
Al Hussein noted that under international law, particularly the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which Indonesia has ratified, countries
which have not abolished the death penalty may only use capital punishment for
"the most serious crimes."
He pointed out that drug-related offenses do not fall under this threshold of
"most serious crimes," which have been interpreted to mean only crimes
involving intentional killing.
He said that while he acknowledges the challenges faced by Indonesia in
combating drug-related crimes, the country's response must be rooted in
international human rights law.
Phl death penalty bill
Meanwhile, the death penalty bill in the House of Representatives faces rough
sailing as opposition congressmen are determined to block its passage.
"We will fight tooth and nail any and all attempts to renew the death penalty
and send us back to the medieval ages," Rep. Lito Atienza of party-list group
Buhay said yesterday.
He said he and his pro-life colleagues would argue doggedly against any measure
that seeks to re-impose capital punishment.
Another opposition lawmaker, Harry Roque of Kabayan, said he, like Atienza, is
against the revival of the death penalty.
"What we need to do is to reform the criminal justice system," he said.
The 2 belong to the opposition bloc led by Minority Leader Danilo Suarez.
Ironically, Suarez is supporting President Duterte's proposal for re-imposition
of the death penalty.
(source: Philippine Star)
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