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Communist Vietnam's secret death penalty conveyor belt: How country trails only China and Iran for 'astonishing' number of executions

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Prisoners are dragged from their cells at 4am without warning to be given a lethal injection Vietnam's use of the death penalty has been thrust into the spotlight after a real estate tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to be executed in one of the biggest corruption cases in the country's history. Truong My Lan, a businesswoman who chaired a sprawling company that developed luxury apartments, hotels, offices and shopping malls, was arrested in 2022.

Portugal wants end to death penalty in Equatorial Guinea or expulsion from CPLP

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Augusto Santos Silva
Portugal's foreign minister Augusto Santos Silva
Portugal's foreign minister has said that Equatorial Guinea must abolish the death penalty immediately or its membership of the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries (CPLP) will be illegitimate.

"From Portugal's point of view, [the abolition of the death penalty] has to be immediate", Augusto Santos Silva said on Tuesday on the sidelines of the 11th CPLP head of states' conference that ended in Brasilia on Tuesday.

For Portugal, there are 3 essential conditions that Equatorial Guinea has to meet to be a member of the CPLP: the ratification of the organisation's articles, the abolition of the death penalty and the generalisation of teaching Portuguese in the country. Hardly anybody speaks Portuguese in this 'Portuguese-speaking country'.

"We understand that the third demand may take longer, but the other 2 just depend on the authorities", Santos Silva said.

In the final declaration signed at the Brasilia summit, Equatorial Guinea dragged its heels again by asking for 'technical support' to abolish the death penalty, which the other countries responded to "with satisfaction".

Equatorial Guinea became a full member of the CPLP at the Dili summit in July 2014 at the insistence of Angola, on the condition that it abolish the death penalty and start teaching Portuguese in the former Spanish colony that no other reputable organisations want as a member.

Source: theportugalnews.com, November 4, 2016

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