FEATURED POST

Iran | Man Saves Mother’s Murderer Before Own Execution

Published
Image
Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); November 29, 2023: Morad Biranvand was executed for drug-related charges in Khorramabad Central Prison. Prior to execution, he granted forgiveness to his mother’s murderer, saving his life from death row. According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, a man was executed in Khorramabad Central Prison on 29 November. His identity has been established as 40-year-old Morad (Allah) Biranvand who was on death row for drug-related charges.

Russia | Putin pardons convicted killer of famed Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya

Published
Russian dictator Vladimir Putin pardoned the convicted killer of famed Russian opposition journalist Anna Politkovskaya after his military service in Ukraine, Russian state-controlled media RBC reported on Nov. 14.

Former Russian police officer Sergei Khadzhikurbanov was convicted of his role in Politkovskaya's murder in 2014 and sentenced to 20 years in prison. He has been imprisoned since then but went to fight in Ukraine as part of the Kremlin's drive to recruit prisoners.

In 2022, the Russian authorities allowed Wagner Group to recruit prisoners in Russian jails. Russia's Defense Ministry has also recruited from Russian jails. Under this procedure, they were pardoned in exchange for military service.

The late Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin said in June 2023 that as many as 32,000 former prisoners had returned to Russia after fighting in Ukraine.

Khadzhikurbanov's lawyer did not say when he started to fight in Ukraine or when he received the presidential pardon. Khadzhikurbanov is currently fighting in Ukraine on a contract with Russia's Defense Ministry, his lawyer said.

Politkovskaya came to prominence in large part because of her coverage of Russia's brutal wars in the breakaway Russian Republic of Chechnya, specifically related to her coverage of war crimes and human rights abuses. Apart from working for the independent Russian paper Novaya Gazeta, she also wrote several books about Chechnya. Tens of thousands of civilians were killed in the two wars in the early 90s and 2000s.

She was shot and killed in an elevator in her apartment building in Moscow in 2006. Khadzhikurbanov and four others were found guilty of Politkovskaya's murder, two of whom received life sentences, but it remains unclear exactly who ordered her killing.

Politkovskaya was an outspoken critic of Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov, regularly denouncing his role in human rights abuses in Chechnya. There have been rumors that he, as well as Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, were linked to her death, but no concrete proof.

Source: The Kyiv Independent, Nate Ostiller, November 14, 2023


_____________________________________________________________________











Location: Russia
Related content:

Most Viewed (Last 7 Days)

Iran | Man Saves Mother’s Murderer Before Own Execution

Published
Image
Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO); November 29, 2023: Morad Biranvand was executed for drug-related charges in Khorramabad Central Prison. Prior to execution, he granted forgiveness to his mother’s murderer, saving his life from death row. According to information obtained by Iran Human Rights, a man was executed in Khorramabad Central Prison on 29 November. His identity has been established as 40-year-old Morad (Allah) Biranvand who was on death row for drug-related charges.
Read more

China | 2 Filipinos executed for drug trafficking

Published
Image
Authorities renewed a reminder to Filipinos flying out to be vigilant against drug syndicates and refuse to carry any uninspected package from other people China has executed two Filipinos for drug trafficking despite high-level Philippine government appeals to commute their death sentences to life in prison, the Philippine government said on Saturday. The Department of Foreign Affairs in Manila did not identify the two Filipinos, citing the wishes of their families for privacy. It added that it did not announce the November 24 executions until the Philippine government was formally notified by China.
Read more

Oklahoma Executes Phillip Hancock After Governor Rejects Clemency Recommendation: ​“Phil’s Execution Is Simply Not Justice”, says Oklahoma Legislator

Published
Image
Oklahoma executed Phillip Hancock on November 30 , 2023, following Governor Kevin Stitt’s rejection of the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board’s recommendation that his sentence be commuted to life without parole. The governor’s indecision left Mr. Hancock waiting anxiously right up to the time of his scheduled execution when the governor’s office told the prison warden to proceed.  Mr. Hancock is the 123rd person executed in Oklahoma since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. His execution is also the fourth execution in Oklahoma this year and the final execution of 2023.
Read more

Report: 122 Prisoners Executed in Iran in November

Published
Image
A new report by a human rights group which closely follows how many prisoners are executed in Iran each month offers a chilling look at the surge in capital punishment there. The Hengaw Organization for Human Rights has documented at least 100 executions in Iran over the past month, indicating a stark increase of more than 50% in comparison to the previous month. In a report released Saturday, Hengaw disclosed a notable surge of 56.5% in the number of executions during November, recording 122 compared to the 78 reported in October.
Read more

USA | DPIC Year End Report 2023: High-Profile Innocence Cases Contribute to Public Perception that the Death Penalty is Unfairly Administered

Published
Image
Against a backdrop of high-profile innocence cases and the U.S. Supreme Court’s seeming indifference to them, the 2023 Gallup poll found that more Americans now believe that the death penalty is administered unfairly than fairly.   Use of the death penalty remained geographically isolated, with only five states carrying out executions and only seven imposing death sentences.  For the ninth consecutive year, fewer than 30 people were executed and fewer than 50 were sentenced to death. These findings headline DPIC’s 2023 Year End Report , released on December 1.
Read more

USA | Supreme Court’s Hands-Off Attitude Contributes to Growing Public Doubts about the Death Penalty

Published
Image
Last Friday, the Death Penalty Information Center issued its year-end report . The message is mixed. The report offered evidence of the substantial progress achieved by abolitionists during 2023 in their fight to end capital punishment in the United States. At the same time, it presented a bleak assessment of the Supreme Court’s current attitude toward the death penalty and documented the Court’s unwillingness to ensure fairness in capital cases.
Read more

Philippines | Solon renews call for revival of death penalty after China's execution of 2 Pinoys

Published
Image
The chairperson of the House Committee on Dangerous Drugs is urging Congress anew to consider the reimposition of the death penalty, especially for drug-related offenses, after China executed 2 Filipinos for drug trafficking. 2 Filipinos convicted of drug trafficking in China were executed in November, 10 years after their arrest, the Department of Foreign Affairs disclosed on Dec. 2. In a statement on Monday, Surigao del Norte Rep. Robert Ace Barbers said that the country is extending "kid's gloves treatment if not VIP treatment" to foreigners, especially Chinese nationals, arrested and convicted for drug trafficking in the Philippines.
Read more

USA | Alabama Remains an Outlier as Death Penalty Decline Continues

Published
Image
As one of only five states that executed people this year—and one of only seven states that sentenced people to death—Alabama remains an outlier in its continued use of the death penalty, according to the Death Penalty Information Center’s Year End Report . The death penalty’s nationwide decline continued in 2023, which DPIC reports is the ninth consecutive year with fewer than 30 people executed and fewer than 50 people sentenced to death. Alabama imposed three of this year’s 21 new death sentences. Two of the three were sentenced to death even though jurors did not agree that death was the appropriate sentence.
Read more

Arizona | Ex-cop Derek Chauvin back in prison after surviving 22 stab wounds

Published
Image
The inmate was charged with attempted murder and has been transferred to a different corrections facility in Tucson TUCSON, Ariz. — Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted in the killing of George Floyd, has returned to the prison where he was stabbed 22 times last month. The 47-year-old ex-cop’s lawyer told the Minneapolis Star Tribune Chauvin’s condition had improved to where he could be released from a Tucson, Ariz., hospital, but they remain “ very concerned” the federal penitentiary where he’s incarcerated will be unable to keep him safe.
Read more

Yemen | Houthi court sentences Yemeni women’s rights activist to death

Published
Image
AL-MUKALLA: A court in Houthi-held Sanaa on Tuesday condemned a women’s rights rights activist to death for spying, sparking an uproar in Yemen and abroad against the Iran-backed militia. Abdul Majeed Sabra, a Yemeni lawyer, told Arab News that the Specialized Criminal Court of First Instance in Sanaa sentenced Fatema Saleh Mohammed Al-Arwali, an activist and head of the Yemeni branch of the Arab League’s Arab Women Leadership Council, to death for gathering military intelligence and sending key Houthi locations to the Coalition to Restore Legitimacy in Yemen to be bombed.
Read more