Death Penalty News

Buddhists, along with a growing number of members of other religions, believe that the death penalty is fundamentally unethical. From the Buddhist perspective, non-violence, or not harming others, is the heart of the Buddha’s teachings. His Holiness the Dalai Lama signed Amnesty International’s pledge against the death penalty several years ago, and has spoken out against it on multiple occasions. He opposes the death penalty because it punishes the person and not the action. Buddhism does allow ending the life of another when it is done in self-defense, and the argument could be made that, sometimes, capital punishment could be viewed as a society’s attempt at self-defense. But when there are other means available to prevent a person from harming others, such as imprisonment, it would seem that the less lethal option should be favored. Countering violence with violence only results in more violence. The true enemy is our own self-cherishing and self-grasping tendencies, and the n...

The Dalai Lama CHICAGO— The Dalai Lama praised Illinois for recently abolishing the death penalty during a talk Sunday, but the Tibetan spiritual leader steered clear of politically sensitive issues related to China. Comments by the Nobel Peace Prize laureate to more than 10,000 admirers at the University of Illinois at Chicago came after China angrily rebuked President Barack Obama for meeting with the Dalai Lama on Saturday. The only politics the 76-year-old touched on was the decision earlier this year by Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn to sign legislation banning capital punishment. He praised Quinn, who briefly joined the Dalai Lama on stage. "This state abolished the death sentence," the Tibetan Buddhist monk said. "When I heard that, I immediately shook hands with the governor (before the event started) and said congratulations. ... I really appreciated it." Once on stage, dressed in crimson-red and gold robes, he gave Quinn a traditional blessing by placing a...

Tibetan exiles have reported the first executions of those convicted for rioting last year in Lhasa, with at least two people put to death in a rare implementation of capital punishment in the restive region. Two Tibetans convicted of arson and sentenced to death in April were executed on Tuesday morning in Lhasa, reported The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, which is based in the Indian town of Dharamsala—the home in exile of the Dalai Lama. It said that Lobsang Gyaltsen and Loyak had been sentenced to death for their part in setting fire to five shops in the Tibetan capital, killing seven people, in the riot that rocked Lhasa in March last year. Officials say that 21 people — including three Tibetan protesters — died in the violence, which embarrassed Beijing just as it was preparing to stage the Olympic Games and prompted a security crackdown across the Himalayan region. The body of Mr. Gyaltsen had been returned to his family and then submitted to a river burial—an un...