FEATURED POST

First Third Of 2024 In Saudi Arabia: Executions Rise By 189% And Portend Another Bloody Year. At Least 71 Currently Facing Execution.

Published
Image
Since the beginning of 2024 until the end of April, the Ministry of Interior in Saudi Arabia announced the execution of 55 individuals. This figure constitutes a 189% increase compared to the executions in the first third of 2023, which witnessed 19 executions. The European Saudi Organization for Human Rights views these numbers as a clear indication of the Saudi government's continued approach towards executing and issuing death sentences, and that the promises made in recent years have become elusive.

Kazakhstan MPs suggest removing death penalty from Criminal Code

Published
Death penalty may be removed from the Kazakhstan's Criminal Code. Such a suggestion has been made in the country's Majilis (lower chamber), Tengrinews reports.

"We believe there is a unique possibility to take a sound decision to completely remove death penalty from the Criminal Code", some majilismen said when unveiling draft amendments into the Criminal Code.

In December 2003 Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev introduced an unlimited moratorium on capital punishment. From 1990 to 2003 there were 536 executions carriedty out in Kazakhstan. Currently about 100 people are serving life-long sentences.

According to Johan Merkel, Vice General Prosecutor, the General Prosecutor's Office doesn't support full abolishment of capital punishment.

"I heard no arguments in favor of abolishment [of death penalty] apart from the argument that having death penalty in the list of punishments is a sign of backwoods mentality (...) Then let us classify the USA as a backwoods mentality nation [they do apply capital punishment]", Mr. Merkel said.

He emphasized that the state should have a clear-cut mechanism to protect its own citizens. "Why should we neglect the rights of the bereaved [for justice]? (...) Kazakhstan's courts are cautious when applying this measure [actually replaced with a life-long sentence], although there are some truly spine-chilling crimes [that are widely believed to deserve capital punishment]. The General Prosecutor's Office will never support the full abolishment; although, this measure might be renounced for some crimes", he said.

Majilismen representing the People's Communist Party are in favor of further applying capital punishment. "We do emphasize that capital punishment is not a silver bullet. We believe that terror acts, premeditated murders (...) should be penalized with capital punishment. There should be a strong warning for every potential criminal that committing a certain crime s/he risks her or his life. The fear of being executed is a strong deterrent", Majilisman Vladimir Kossarev of the People's Communist Party commented.

Earlier Mr. Merkel said that the country's Constitution doesn't allow to fully abolish capital punishment.

Source: TengriNews, January 23, 2014
Related content:

Most Viewed (Last 7 Days)

First Third Of 2024 In Saudi Arabia: Executions Rise By 189% And Portend Another Bloody Year. At Least 71 Currently Facing Execution.

Published
Image
Since the beginning of 2024 until the end of April, the Ministry of Interior in Saudi Arabia announced the execution of 55 individuals. This figure constitutes a 189% increase compared to the executions in the first third of 2023, which witnessed 19 executions. The European Saudi Organization for Human Rights views these numbers as a clear indication of the Saudi government's continued approach towards executing and issuing death sentences, and that the promises made in recent years have become elusive.
Read more

20 Minutes to Death: Witness to the Last Execution in France

Published
Image
The following document is a written record of convicted killer Hamida Djandoubi's last moments before he was guillotined in a Marseilles prison on September 10, 1977. This written record -- dated September 9 -- was written by a judge appointed to witness the execution. Djandoubi's execution was the last execution carried out in France before capital punishment was abolished in 1981. Then-President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, who had voiced his "loathing for the death penalty" before he was elected to office, flatly turned down Djandoubi's appeal for clemency and chose to let "Justice run its course", as he did on two previous instances ( Christian Ranucci , executed on July 28, 1976 and Jérôme Carrein , executed on June 23, 1977). Hamida Djandoubi , a Tunisian national, was sentenced to death for killing his former lover, Elisabeth Bousquet. He was executed in Marseilles' Baumettes prison in September 1977. The following text was writ
Read more

Mississippi | Biloxi man gets death penalty for torture, murder of toddler

Published
Image
A Mississippi Coast man is headed to death row for his role in the beating and suffocation death of his 2-year-old stepson — all because the toddler soiled his diaper and took too long to get a juice box out of the refrigerator. A jury in Harrison County Circuit Court in Biloxi deliberated for just over two hours Friday before handing down the death sentence against Joseph David Heard, 41, in the Dec. 27, 2021, killing of his stepson, Hayden Lee Bataille, of Biloxi. 
Read more

Saudi authorities agree to postpone execution of Kenyan national

Published
Image
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 13 – Saudi Arabia has acceded to Kenya’s request to postpone the execution of Stephen Munyakho that was set for Wednesday to allow for further negotiations between all parties. According to Foreign Affairs Principal Secretary Korir Sing’Oei, Kenya will be engaging stakeholders in Nairobi and Riyadh, including religious leaders, to agree on the next urgent steps.
Read more

Singapore | Court of Appeal overturns man’s death sentence, cites prosecution’s inconsistent case

Published
Image
SINGAPORE - The Court of Appeal has overturned the conviction of a 63-year-old man who had been sentenced to death for heroin trafficking because the prosecution had run an inconsistent case during his trial regarding when the drugs were delivered to him. In a written judgment delivered by Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon on May 8, the court said the evidence did not support a finding being made beyond a reasonable doubt on when exactly the two bundles of heroin were delivered to Mohamed Mubin Abdul Rahman.
Read more

Cruel and Unusual: Documentary explores epicenter of Texas’ prison system

Published
Image
Every few years, from childhood until my late teens, my granddad would take me along with him to the small Texas town where he grew up—Normangee, population 522—to visit old relatives and even older graves. The drive took us up I-45, beyond the Houston sprawl, past pine forests, and eventually through Huntsville, epicenter of the state prison system. One of the city’s seven prisons was just off the interstate, and as we passed by I’d stare at the guard towers and barbed wire before turning my attention across the street to the Texas Prison Museum, which had its own mock guard towers in the parking lot. (“Prison” and “museum” were words that never seemed to go together.) Later, I learned that the museum’s central attraction was the wooden electric chair the state used for executions until 1964.
Read more