Thailand: The Year 2009: 10 Steps Backwards

Step 9. Resumption of Capital Punishment

On 24th August 2009, the Corrections Department executed 2 persons, Bundit Jaroenwanit and Jirawat Poompreuk., after a suspension of executions for 6 years. The executions indicate the government's failure to respect human rights, of which a respect for human life is the most basic of all. The example of the 139 countries worldwide which have renounced the death penalty bears witness to the conviction that no authority on earth can deprive a human being of life. The executions also ignore the proclamation of the United Nations General Assembly on the 8th December 2007 and again in December 2008, calling on all countries to suspend executions as a stage in the total abandonment of the death penalty. While the decree is not legally binding it has immense moral force. (Proclamation 62/149 of UNGA)

Source: Scoop News, Feb. 11, 2010

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