Jan. 21
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES:
Fresh hearing after druggie's death penalty is commuted----He was found guilty
of possessing, trafficking and using drugs.
An expat, who was convicted of dealing and consuming marijuana and other
psychotropic drugs, will have his case heard again by the appeal court.
The Federal Supreme Court in Abu Dhabi cancelled an earlier ruling by the
Appeal Court, which had commuted the death penalty handed to the Arab man by a
lower court, to life imprisonment. He was found guilty of possessing,
trafficking and using drugs.
Official court documents stated that the police in a northern emirate had
arrested the man. Authorities also seized a huge amount of drugs from the Arab
man. A forensic report revealed that the man had consumed drugs.
Prosecutors had charged him with drug possession, using drugs and promoting
them in the country. The Arab man had admitted to possessing drugs, stressing
that it was only for personal use. He denied promoting the marijuana in the
UAE.
The court of first instance had sentenced the man to death and fined him
Dh40,000. The convict then appealed the verdict, after which the appellate
court commuted his death sentence. The prosecution and the convict then
appealed this ruling at the UAE's top court, which ordered the appellate court
to hear the case afresh.
(source: khaleejtimes.com)
IRAQ----female/foreign national gets death sentence
German woman sentenced to death in Iraq for joining Islamic State
An Iraqi criminal court has ruled that a German woman of Moroccan descent
should incur the death penalty for joining Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS),
according to the court's spokesman.
The case marks the 1st time a foreign woman has been sentenced to death in Iraq
for joining the group, as Reuters reports.
The woman, whose name hasn't been disclosed, was guilty of "offering logistic
support and helping the terrorist group to carry out criminal acts," as well as
"taking part in attacks against security forces," the Supreme Judicial
Council's spokesman, Abdul-Sattar Bayrkda, said, according to AP.
The defendant joined IS after she travelled from Germany to Syria and further
to Iraq, along with her 2 daughters, who eventually married militants, Bayrkda
said. The woman was captured by Iraqi forces last year during the battle for
Mosul.
The sentence of death by hanging can be appealed, the spokesman added.
Following Baghdad declaring victory over IS in Mosul in July 2017, the Iraqi
military caught a group of female fighters, including 4 German nationals. At
the time, media reports said that 2 women, 1 of Moroccan origin and the other
Chechen-born, were among those detained. Additionally, a German teenage girl
was arrested after she converted to Islam and went missing for a year.
According to German media, the girl, named as Linda W., is still held in Iraqi
detention, with her potential extradition still in question.
In October last year, the Iraqi ambassador to Belgium, Jawad Al-Chlaihawi, told
local media that nearly 14,000 family members of suspected IS militants were
being held near Mosul. At least 100 Europeans would be tried in Iraq, with most
of them likely to receive a death sentence, Al-Chlaihawi said.
(source: rt.com)
PAKISTAN:
ASJ awards death penalty to 2 murderers
The Additional and Sessions Judge Tariq Khurshid Khawaja on Saturday imposed
fines and awarded death penalty to 2 men found guilty of killing 4 people in
Jatli in 2013.
The 2 convicts were identified as Raja Usman and Raja Munir. Jatli police had
registered a case and arrested Raja Usman along with his cousin Raja Munir for
murdering his father Muhammad Faiz, brother Muhammad Nazir and 2 sisters over
marriage dispute in Nabin Janjua village, within limits of Police Station
Jatli.
According to details, ASJ Gujar Khan Tariq Khurshid Khawaja took up quartet
murder case during which the prosecution told the court that the investigation
found that 2 men were involved in killing of 4 persons in Jatli. The
prosecution demanded a death penalty for the killers. The defense failed to
provide any substantial evidence that could prove the 2 killers innocent.
(source: nation.com.pk)
INDIA:
Haryana Rapes: Death penalty for rape of girls under 12----Here is what may
come soon----The government will also make a request for setting up of
fast-track courts for dealing with rape cases to provide a speedy justice
Under fire for a series of rape cases, Manohar Lal Khattar-led Haryana
Government is set to bring a law to provide capital punishment for those found
guilty of raping girls aged 12 years or less. The government will also make a
request for setting up of fast-track courts for dealing with rape cases to
provide a speedy justice delivery system to the victims. The announcement was
made by the chief minister while he was addressing people after laying the
foundation stone of a sugar mill here.
Khattar, who expressed anguish and concern over the recent incidents of rape,
said that provisions of "harsher punishment for rape" are required in the
state. "Law would be enacted soon to hang those convicted of raping girls aged
12 or younger," he said. Further, Khattar asked media not to create sensation
by publishing reports on rape without verifying facts.
However, the CM also added that 25 % rape complaints registered last year at
police stations were fake. "Earlier, complainants had to face a tough time in
getting an FIR registered even after repeated requests. But today, not even a
single person can claim non-registration of FIRs in any case by the police," he
said. The chief minister further said that relatives and near and dear ones of
the victims have been found to be involved in about 75 % of rape cases.
Khattar said that besides the police, society should also take the
responsibility to generate awareness among the people against such kind of
mentality. The chief minister assured the people that the state police was
actively working to solve the recent cases of rape in the state.
Khattar is under fire for alleged under-performance on account of maintaining
Law and Order in the state. First, brutal gangrape and killing of a 6-year-old
girl took place in Haryana's Uklana area and then 2 other incidents in a
similar manner elsewhere in the state have sparked protests. The 1st incident,
in December 2017, came to light when a passersby noticed the girl on a deserted
street. As per the police, unidentified men had allegedly abducted the girl
when she was sleeping with her sister and mother in their home in a slum area.
After the post-mortem report, police said that kidnappers had even inserted a
wooden stick in her private parts. Again in January, barely a month after a
six-year-old girl was brutalised, 2 separate incidents of rapes and brutality
sent shockwaves across the states. In the 1st case, a 15-year-old school
student was brutally assaulted and her private parts were mutilated. The other
case too involved the rape and murder of an 11-year-old girl.
(source: financialexpress.com)
PHILIPPINES:
Reinstating the death penalty a violation of international law
Last of 2 parts
Opposition to the move to reimpose the death penalty has been most eloquently
expressed by Archbishop Socrates B. Villegas, president of the Catholic Bishops
Conference of the Philippines, in his pastoral statement on March 19, 2017:
"On the day the death penalty was repealed by the Philippine Congress on June
24, 2006, the lights were turned on in the Colosseum in Rome. History tells us
how many people, among them countless Christian martyrs. were publicly executed
in that infamous arena. Perhaps to erase the darkness of inhumanity that the
Colosseum has been associated with, the citizens of Rome have since made it a
point to have it illuminated, each time another country decides to repeal its
capital punishment law. Each illumination has been made to symbolize another
advancement in human civilization. Are we to reverse that advancement by
restoring the death penalty again in the Philippines?
Even with the best of intentions, capital punishment has never been proven
effective as a deterrent to crime.
Obviously, it is easier to eliminate criminals than to get rid of the root
causes of criminality in society. Capital punishment and a flawed legal system
are always a lethal mix. And since in any human society there is never a
guarantee of a flawless legal system, there is always the great likelihood that
those without capital will get the punishment more quickly because it is they
who cannot afford a good lawyer and a guarantee of due process. As a law, the
death penalty directly contradicts the principle of inalienability of the basic
human right to life, which is enshrined in most Constitutions of countries that
signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights."
To the arguments against the reimposition of the death penalty, an
international law dimension has been added with the ratification by the
Philippines on November 20, 2007 of the Second Optional Protocol to the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).
The Human Rights Commission deserves credit for this development. The late
Commissioner Quisumbling in her abovementioned briefing paper said: "Today's
challenge to the Commission on Human Rights and the Right to Life advocates is
to campaign for the ratification of the Second Optional Protocol and
institutionalize efforts towards the approach of restorative justice."
The ICCPR is 1 of the international Bill of Rights agreements, the others being
the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The ICCPR commits its parties to respect
the civil and political rights of individuals, including the right to life,
freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, electoral rights,
and rights to due process and fair trial. The ICCPR was 12 years in the making,
drafted in 1954, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 19,
1965, and entered into force on March 23, 1976. The Philippines was only 1 of 6
original signatories of the covenant. (The others were Costa Rica, Cyprus,
Honduras, Israel, and Jamaica.) However, it took a long time for the
Philippines to ratify the covenant, doing so only on January 23, 1987. O the
Asean countries, Vietnam was ahead of the Philippines in ratifying(1982), but
the Philippines was ahead of Cambodia (1992), Thailand (1997), Indonesia (2006)
and Laos (2009). Malaysia, Myanmar, and Singapore are neither signatories nor
parties.
The ICCPR has 2 optional protocols, The First Optional Protocol establishes an
international complaints mechanism allowing individuals to complain to the UN
Human Rights Committee about violations of the covenant. As of September 2013,
the First Optional Protocol has 115 states parties, including the Philippines.
The Second Optional Protocol, adopted on December 15, 1989 and which took
effect on July 11, 1991, abolishes the death penalty, although countries were
permitted to make a reservation allowing for the use of the death penalty for
most serious crimes of a military nature committed during wartime. As of
December 2017, the Second Optional Protocol has 85 parties and 2 states which
have signed but not ratified. The Philippines signed on September 20, 2006 and
ratified on November 20, 2007. It did not make any declarations or reservations
to the Second Optional Protocol. So far, the Philippines is the only Asean
state party to the Protocol.
About the Second Optional Protocol, the question has been asked: "Is the
abolition of the death penalty in a state party definitive and irrevocable?"
Experts on the subject say, "the Second Optional Protocol is significant at the
national level since it virtually precludes reinstatement of the death penalty.
Indeed, any State Party wishing to reintroduce the death penalty would have
first to withdraw from the Protocol. The absence in the Protocol of a
procedural clause for withdrawal means that once a State has ratified the
Second Optional Protocol, the death penalty can never be reintroduced without
violating international law."
Today there are 2 countries both state parties to the Second Optional Protocol
that have announced their intentions to reintroduce the death penalty: Turkey
(ratified March 2006) and the Philippines. Turkish President Recep Tayyip
Erdogan said on October 29, 2016 that his government would ask Parliament to
consider reintroducing the death penalty as a punishment for the plotters
behind the July coup bid. The Philippines' House of Representatives has voted
to reimpose the death penalty for drug crimes. Should the moves of these
countries prosper in the light of experts' views that "once a State Party has
ratified the Second Optional Protocol, the death penalty can never be
introduced without violating international law?"
Historically, the death penalty has been used in almost every country of the
world. Today it has been either abolished or discontinued in practice by a
large majority of nations. 55 countries have retained the death penalty in law
or practice, while 103 have abolished it for all crimes and 37 have abolished
it de facto. Those seeking to reimpose the death penalty appear to be out of
step with the advancement of the world in human rights and moving contrary to
international law.
(source: Manila Times)
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