On the rare occasions that Zulfiqar Ali Khan, 43, is allowed to leave his cell in Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, he passes the gallows where he will one day be executed.
A manicured path leads up to the whitewashed wooden gallows, and on either side there are neat flowerbeds, according to Sarah Belal, Mr. Khan's lawyer.
Above the place where some of Pakistan's criminals are put to death by hanging, there are 2 inscriptions in Urdu script, Ms. Belal said. One is an Islamic prayer traditionally spoken when someone dies and the 2nd reads, "We hate the crime, not the human being."
Mr. Khan is one of more than 8,300 inmates currently on death row in Pakistan, according to estimates by Amnesty International, a U.K.-based human rights group. He was found guilty of 2 counts of murder and has been awaiting execution for 15 years - his date with death has been scheduled more than 22 times.
A recent move by the new government, which took office in early June, means that Mr. Khan, who claims he acted in self-defense when he killed 2 men, will likely very soon be taken to the gallows to die.
The government, led by prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his party, the Pakistan Muslim League - Nawaz, ended a 5-year moratorium on executions in June.
The new administration justified the move as part of their tough stance on crime as they try to tackle Pakistan's deteriorating law and order situation. Omar Hamid Khan, spokesman for the interior ministry, described capital punishment as key to deterring crime in Karachi, the violent southern megacity, and in the country's restive border areas.
But the decision has provoked a backlash from international human rights organizations.
"Politically it can make a government look like it is tough on crime," said Mustafa Qadri, Pakistan researcher for Amnesty International. "But it is a backwards step in comparison with the rest of the world and it is a backwards step in terms of [Pakistan's] relations with the rest of the world."
Mr. Qadri added that in a country where much of the instability comes from the willingness of ideologically driven people to kill themselves and other people in suicide attacks, he wasn't clear how the death penalty could be seen as a deterrent.
During Mr. Sharif's last term in office in the 1990s, there were regular state executions. They continued during Pervez Musharraf's 9-year military rule. Through the 1990s and 2000s Pakistan had one of the highest execution rates, according to Amnesty International, behind China, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the U.S.
In 2008, the Pakistan People's Party introduced a ban on capital punishment soon after they took office. The party has historically been against the death penalty. Its founder Zulfikar Ali Bhutto commuted all death sentences to life imprisonment during his rule though the 1970s. He was later put to death by hanging under the rule of military dictator Zia-ul-Haq in 1979.
The 2008 ban on executions brought in by the PPP, was welcomed by activists and human rights organizations. They hoped that the informal moratorium would eventually add Pakistan to the list of more than 150 countries that have either abolished the death penalty or stopped administering it.
With the ban in place, executions stopped. But the last government dragged its feet over converting the ban into an official moratorium, despite pressure from human rights groups. As the PPP's 5-year term in office came to an end, the party lacked the political strength to push through any changes.
Hannah Sladen, spokesperson for the Justice Project Pakistan, a Pakistan-based non-profit human rights law firm that represents Mr. Khan, said that if the ban had been strengthened by an official decree it would have been harder for the new government to reverse the move.
While there has been a 5-year embargo on executions, death sentences have continued to be handed out by the courts and Pakistan's death row population has swelled.
According to figures gathered by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, 300 people per year on average are placed on death row. With over 8,300 people awaiting execution in Pakistan, the country now has one of the largest death row populations in the world, according to Amnesty International.
Over the last 5 years, prisoners sentenced to death have continued to have their executions scheduled, only for them to be delayed each time after a presidential intervention, which often comes just days - and in some cases hours - before the scheduled execution time. Under the constitution the president has to approve all executions.
It is not clear when executions will resume. The current president, Mr. Zardari of the PPP remains in office until early September. A new president will then be voted in by the PML-N dominated parliament. Sarah Belal, Mr. Khan's lawyer, expects executions will resume after that.
Source: Wall Street Journal, July 17, 2013