Pakistani national on death row in Indonesia passes away

Pakistani national on death row in Indonesia Zulfiqar Ali, who was said to have been 'wrongly convicted' in a drugs case, passed away on Thursday.

Earlier during the day, Ali was shifted to an Intensive Care Unit and requests were being made to shift him to Pakistan.

A Pakistani rights group, the Justice Project Pakistan (JPP) had appealed on Indonesia to free Zulfiqar Ali on humanitarian grounds.

The JPP, which opposes capital punishment, had earlier said in a statement today that 54-year-old Zulfiqar Ali could soon die after his health deteriorated while in a Jakarta prison hospital.

Sarah Belal, executive director at Justice Project Pakistan, said they cannot save Ali's life but are trying to help him "die a free man."

There was no immediate response from Indonesia.

Zulfiqar Ali was diagnosed with stage 4 liver cancer in December 2017 and had also been suffering from chronic liver cirrhosis and Diabetes Mellitus.

Ali was arrested in November 2004 and later convicted on drug smuggling charges which carry the death sentence in Indonesia.

The rights group claims his trial was unfair and that he was wrongfully convicted.

President Mamnoon Hussain had also asked Indonesia President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo to pardon Ali.

Source: The Nation, May 31, 2018

Terminally ill prisoner Zulfiqar Ali passes away in Indonesia

Zulfiqar Ali, a terminally ill Pakistani on death row in Indonesia, has passed away, Justice Project Pakistan (JPP), which had been advocating on his behalf, said in a public statement on Thursday.

"Zulfiqar, 54, died from liver cancer which he had been diagnosed with in Dec 2017. He leaves behind 5 children and his wife, Siti. His mother, based in Lahore, was unable to fly to Jakarta to meet her son for the final time," the JPP stated.

He passed away hours after being transferred to an Intensive Care Unit in an Indonesian hospital earlier in the day. Soon after he was admitted, the JPP had issued an urgent appeal to bring Ali back to Pakistan, noting that he had "just hours to live".

Ali's demise brings to an end the hectic campaign to overturn his wrongful conviction and repatriate him to Pakistan, where he wanted to breathe his last.

"It is with the heaviest heart that we announce the passing away of Zulfiqar Ali," JPP said on Twitter late Thursday afternoon. "He is mourned by his family and lawyers, who fought for his life until the very end."

The Foreign Office said that the government had been making efforts for his repatriation and now the Embassy of Pakistan in Jakarta is coordinating with Ali's family to bring his body back to Pakistan.

The JPP had recalled that while visiting Pakistan, Indonesian President Joko Widodo had "promised Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi that he would grant Zulfiqar Ali clemency on humanitarian grounds."

President Widodo had said during his visit that although Ali's release was a legal matter, he would "look into the matter on humanitarian grounds".

"The Government of Pakistan must urge President Widodo to pardon Zulfiqar in light of his terminal illness at the earliest, that has taken a turn for the worse, and the suffering he has already undergone as a result of his wrongful imprisonment," the JPP had appealed in a press statement earlier today.

“We cannot save his life but we can remove his wrongful conviction so he can die a free man. A promise is a promise,” JPP Executive Director Sarah Belal had said.

Ali, behind whom the country rallied in 2016, had been diagnosed with terminal cancer while still in prison.

The father of five was detained for nearly 14 years for a wrongful conviction. He was arrested in November, 2004 after his flat mate was caught with 300 grams of heroin in Jakarta, a city that he wasn’t even in at the time. To review his sentence, the former president of Indonesia had commissioned an inquiry in 2010 which had found Ali to be innocent. Nonetheless, in July 2016, warrants for his execution by firing squad were issued.

"This means that the fact of Zulfiqar’s innocence was ignored by both Governments for 8 years," the JPP regretted.

Ali's attending physician had confirmed in January that he was suffering from stage-4 liver cancer and had three months to live. He was also suffering from chronic liver cirrhosis and Diabetes Mellitus.

Earlier this year, while talking to Dawn over the phone, the 52-year-old had said that his wife was staying with him in the prison hospital to look after him.

“They can’t treat me here...it is a prison hospital...the doctors are here to monitor me but I have to go to private hospitals for treatment and it’s very expensive here. I just want to go home,” he had said.

"Zulfiqar’s death is evidence of the dangers of government inaction to protect its most vulnerable citizens abroad. Had a consular protection policy been in place, Zulfiqar could have spent his final moments with his family on home soil," the JPP said.

Source: Dawn, May 31, 2018

⚑ | Report an error, an omission, a typo; suggest a story or a new angle to an existing story; submit a piece, a comment; recommend a resource; contact the webmaster, contact us: deathpenaltynews@gmail.com.

Opposed to Capital Punishment? Help us keep this blog up and running! DONATE!

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde

Boston Marathon bomber’s appeal of death sentence marked by delays and secrecy

As the city marks the 12th anniversary of the Boston Marathon bombings, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev sits on federal death row for admittingly detonating bombs at the finish line that killed three people and injured more than 260 others. Yet, his fate remains uncertain after a decade of legal wrangling, as his lawyers continue to challenge his death sentence. The federal judge who presided over his 2015 trial was ordered by an appeals court in March 2024 to investigate defense claims that two jurors were biased and should have been stricken from the panel. If he finds they were, then Tsarnaev is entitled to a new trial over whether he should be sentenced to life in prison or death, according to the appeals court.

USA | Who are the death row executioners? Disgraced doctors, suspended nurses and drunk drivers

These are just the US executioners we know. But they are a chilling indication of the executioners we don’t know Being an executioner is not the sort of job that gets posted in a local wanted ad. Kids don’t dream about being an executioner when they grow up, and people don’t go to school for it. So how does one become a death row executioner in the US, and who are the people doing it? This was the question I couldn’t help but ask when I began a book project on lethal injection back in 2018. I’m a death penalty researcher, and I was trying to figure out why states are so breathtakingly bad at a procedure that we use on cats and dogs every day. Part of the riddle was who is performing these executions.

Singapore executes man for 2017 murder of pregnant wife and daughter

Teo Ghim Heng, who strangled his pregnant wife and four-year-old daughter in 2017 before burning their bodies, was executed on 16 April 2025 after exhausting all legal avenues. His clemency pleas were rejected and his conviction upheld by the Court of Appeal in 2022. Teo Ghim Heng, who was convicted of murdering his pregnant wife and their four-year-old daughter in 2017, was executed on 16 April 2025. The Singapore Prison Service confirmed that Teo’s death sentence was carried out at Changi Prison Complex. In a news release on the same day, the police stated: “He was accorded full due process under the law, and was represented by legal counsel both at the trial and at the appeal. His petitions to the President for clemency were unsuccessful.”

USA | They were on federal death row. Now they may go to a supermax prison.

A group of federal prisoners filed a lawsuit this week accusing the Trump administration of seeking to move them to a supermax prison to face tougher conditions as punishment for having their death sentences commuted by President Joe Biden. President Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized Biden’s decision to commute the sentences of 37 federal death row inmates to life in prison without parole. After his inauguration, Trump ordered that the former death row prisoners be housed “in conditions consistent with the monstrosity of their crimes and the threats they pose.”

Indonesia | British grandmother who has spent 12 years on death row hugs grandchildren for first time as they visit Bali prison

Lindsay Sandiford, 68, reportedly shared 'cuddles and kisses' with her loved ones for the first time in years A British grandmother who has been stuck on death row in Bali for more than a decade has been reunited with her loved ones for the first time in years. Lindsay Sandiford has been locked up in Indonesia's notorious Kerobokan Prison since 2013 after being found guilty of trying to smuggle £1.6million of cocaine into the country.

Indiana Supreme Court sets May 20 execution date for death row inmate Benjamin Ritchie

The condemned man has exhausted his appeals but is likely to seek a clemency plea. Indiana Supreme Court justices on Tuesday set a May 20 execution date for death row inmate Benjamin Ritchie, who was convicted in 2002 for killing a law enforcement officer from Beech Grove. The high court’s decision followed a series of exhausted appeals previously filed by Ritchie and his legal team. The inmate’s request for post-conviction relief was denied in Tuesday’s 13-page order, penned by Chief Justice Loretta Rush, although she disagreed with the decision in her opinion.

Afghanistan | Four men publicly executed by Taliban with relatives of victims shooting them 'six or seven times' at sport stadium

Four men have been publicly executed by the Taliban, with relatives of their victims shooting them several times in front of spectators at a sport stadium. Two men were shot around six to seven times by a male relative of the victims in front of spectators in Qala-i-Naw, the centre of Afghanistan's Badghis province, witnesses told an AFP journalist in the city. The men had been 'sentenced to retaliatory punishment' for shooting other men, after their cases were 'examined very precisely and repeatedly', the statement said. 'The families of the victims were offered amnesty and peace but they refused.'

South Carolina executes Mikal Mahdi

Mikal Mahdi, 42, was executed for the 2004 murder of 56-year-old James Myers A man facing the death penalty for committing two murders was executed by firing squad on Friday, the second such execution in the US state of South Carolina this year. Mikal Mahdi, 42, was executed for the 2004 murder of 56-year-old James Myers, an off-duty police officer, and the murder of a convenience store employee three days earlier. According to a statement from the prison, "the execution was performed by a three-person firing squad at 6:01 pm (2201 GMT)," with Mahdi pronounced dead four minutes later.

Louisiana to seek death penalty for child killer despite Biden’s commutation

CATAHOULA PARISH, La. — While a federal death row sentence has been reclassified by former President Joe Biden to life without parole, the State of Louisiana still seeks the death penalty for a man convicted of the kidnapping, torturing and murdering a child in Catahoula Parish. According to a statement by the Seventh Judicial District of Louisiana District Attorney Bradley Burget, on Monday, a Catahoula Parish Grand Jury indicted Thomas Steven Sanders for the first-degree murder of 12-year-old Lexis Kaye Roberts in 2010.

Texas executes Moises Mendoza

Moises Sandoval Mendoza receives lethal injection in Huntsville for death of 20-year-old Rachelle O’Neil Tolleson A Texas man convicted of fatally strangling and stabbing a young mother more than 20 years ago was executed on Wednesday evening. Moises Sandoval Mendoza received a lethal injection at the state penitentiary in Huntsville and was pronounced dead at 6.40pm, authorities said. He was condemned for the March 2004 killing of 20-year-old Rachelle O’Neil Tolleson.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog