Death Penalty News

A 25-year-old Portuguese national was arrested at Changi Airport for allegedly attempting to smuggle approximately 36.3kg of cannabis into Singapore. The arrest occurred on April 14, 2026, though details were released by the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) on April 22. The suspect arrived at Changi Airport on April 14 and was scheduled to depart the following day. His passage through the Terminal 2 Baggage South Red/Green Channel triggered a secondary inspection. K-9 officers from the Singapore Police Force (SPF) assisted in the operation, leading to the discovery of 68 packets of controlled drugs concealed within his luggage.

The Madeiran detained in Indonesia is the son of Rui Óscar, a former Marítimo footballer, who also represented FC Porto and Boavista. SIC Notícias recently reported that the young man, Rui Viana, was also known for his football talent, having played for the youth teams of Marítimo and Câmara de Lobos.

Though capital punishment is in global decline, there are horrifying exceptions to the general trend Next month, Oklahoma will embark on a grim schedule: an execution nearly every month until the end of 2024. In September, it is due to execute Richard Glossip, whom many believe to be the victim of a terrible miscarriage of justice. A 5-year moratorium has come to an end with the failure of a lawsuit arguing that the use of lethal injections was unconstitutional. Oklahoma is not the only place that is enthusiastically resuming state-sanctioned killing after a pause. Myanmar’s rulers announced on Monday that they had executed 4 prisoners, including Phyo Zeya Thaw, a rapper and former MP, drawing international condemnation. This was the first time the death penalty had been used there for more than 30 years, said the UN. And on Tuesday it emerged that Tomohiro Kato has been executed in Japan for stabbing seven people to death in 2008. Recorded executions fell sharply in 2020 across the wo...

Following the bizarre story of two Daesh militants, living in Portugal and funded by the State since 2017, Correio da Manhã has reported on a third foreign citizen in preventive custody in Lisbon following SEF’s execution of an international arrest warrant for connections to and the financing of terrorism. Authorities in India had a reward out on Iqbal Singh, 26, who fled the country ahead of a trial in which he was accused of trafficking over 530 kilos of heroin. The money made from the sale of the heroin was believed to have served to finance terrorist organisations. Back in July – when Singh was arrested in Loures – noticiasaominuto said the money went on the purchase properties that were used as ‘safe houses’. Iqbal Singh was arrested after showing authorities a false passport. He has been in preventive custody ever since. His extradition hearing has finally come up for consideration. The problem, says CM, is that he fears the death penalty if he is extradited. From texts in the ne...

The full extradition agreement between Macau SAR and Portugal has been published in the latest Official Gazette on Monday, with criminal fugitive offenders in the 2 jurisdictions to be handed over to the requested party in accordance with the agreement’s provisions. The delivery may take place for the purpose of criminal prosecution or for the execution of a prison sentence in respect to court rulings within the jurisdiction of the requesting party. According to the agreement, fugitives that have committed or attempted crimes punishable by the law of both parties with one year or more of detention are allowed to be surrendered. Meanwhile, if the purpose of the extradition request is solely for detention, the prison sentence remaining to carried out should be no less than 6 months. Portugal reserves the right to refuse hand over national fugitives requested by Macau authorities in Portugal; while the Macau SAR can refuse to surrender Chinese nationals, permanent resid...

Bangladesh's recent impetus on cracking down on drug abuse and trade has led to some divisive results—while there is no doubt that this is an issue that needs to be addressed, the approach taken by the authorities has been questioned.  The country recently passed the Narcotics Control Bill 2018, which provides for the death penalty for possession of low quantities of certain drugs. This is in contradiction to the recommendations of The Global Commission on Drug Policy , which is a panel of world leaders and intellectuals, committed to studying how the war on drugs has led to “devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world”, and which advocates for a healthcare-based approach to drug policy, as opposed to criminalisation.  Khalid Tinasti, Executive Secretary of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, talks to The Daily Star's Moyukh Mahtab about the healthcare-based approach to drug policy and examples of countries which have had success. Tinas...

The persecution of witches came down to a battle for the 'market share' of post-Reformation Christians, according to a paper by 2 economists It was a terrifying phenomenon that continues to cast a shadow over certain parts of Europe even today. The great age of witch trials, which ran between 1550 and 1700, fascinates and repels in equal measure. Over the course of a century and a half, 80,000 people were tried for witchcraft and 1/2 of them were executed, often burned alive. And then trials disappeared almost completely. Their appearance was all the more strange because between 900 and 1400 the Christian authorities had refused to acknowledge that witches existed, let alone try someone for the crime of being one. This was despite the fact that belief in witches was common in medieval Europe, and in 1258 Pope Alexander IV had to issue a canon to prevent prosecutions. But by 1550 Christian authorities had reversed their position, leading to a witch-hunt across...

The US is seventh in the world in terms of executions United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres has said he wants the US to end its “barbaric practice” of the death penalty. This was the leader of the world body’s first statement on the death penalty. “Please stop the executions,” Mr Guterres said at an event at UN Headquarters in New York, titled “Transparency and the death penalty.” “The death penalty has no place in the 21st century.” Mr Guterres made mention of his home country of Portugal, abolishing the practice nearly 150 years ago and two African nations -  Gambia and Madagascar - which have taken “major steps” towards getting rid of it. In 2016, executions worldwide were down 37 per cent from 2015 as 170 countries have decided to abandon the practise, Mr Guterres said. According to Amnesty International, just four countries make up 87 per cent of executions - Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Pakistan. China has the most number of know...

Gopal Krishna Gandhi The process to elect the Vice-President of the country has started. There is a straight fight between the NDA candidate Venkaiah Naidu, and Opposition’s Gopal Krishna Gandhi. But this piece is not about the election. It is about the place of death penalty in a civilised country like ours, in the context of the protests against Gopal Gandhi on the ground that he had asked for Yakub Menon’s death penalty to be commuted to life imprisonment in the Mumbai blasts case, which had killed many innocent citizens. Headlines were flashed to say that Gopal Gandhi wanted mercy to be given to the terrorists. This was an incorrect interpretation of what he had said. It is not denied that Gopal Gandhi has been a long time opponent of death penalty. Around two years ago, the Law Commission of India had held a seminar on death penalty. I was one of the speakers there. I am for the abolition of death penalty. A near unanimous resolution was passed there for the abolition of deat...

António Guterres Jakarta. United Nations secretary general António Guterres urged the international community on Monday (26/06) to adopt an approach based on prevention and treatment to address drug abuse and drug trafficking. In a statement coinciding with the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, observed on June 26 every year, Guterres cited his experience as prime minister of Portugal and said allocating more resources to prevention, treatment and social reintegration programs contributed to a reduction in drug-related deaths and overall drug use rates in the country. "I know from personal experience how an approach based on prevention and treatment can yield positive results [...] [I] hope this experience will contribute to the discussion and encourage member states to continue exploring comprehensive and evidence-based solutions," Guterres said in the statement. The UN General Assembly decided in 1987 to observe this day as an ex...

Abu Salem Salem cannot get a death term or any jail-term over 25 years as per the terms of his extradition agreed upon by India and Portugal. Mumbai: A special TADA court convicted extradited gangster Abu Salem for his alleged role in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts on Friday, on charges including murder.  However, Salem cannot get a death term or any jail-term over 25 years as per the terms of his extradition agreed upon by India and Portugal. CBI’s lawyer Deepak Salvi said, “Due to the extradition terms, wherein Salem cannot be punished with death, we will request the court to give him life-term, instead of death penalty, even though he deserved death penalty.”  Another CBI source said, “Salem’s extradition, which was made on the basis of the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings of which India and Portugal are signatories, included a few key conditions — if extradited for trial in India, he would neither be conferred with death...

Lisbon, Portugal Portugal on Monday at the United Nations called on countries that still have the death penalty to call a “de facto” moratorium as a first step towards “total abolition” of the death penalty. According to the Portuguese Foreign Minister, Augusto Santos Silva, speaking at the opening session of the 34th meeting of the Human Rights Council, in Geneva, Portugal rejects all the reasons and arguments that attempt to justify the application of the death penalty and that the country calls on all countries that still have the penalty to establish a ‘de facto’ moratorium as a first step towards the total abolition of the death penalty. He noted the importance that Portugal gives to the “evolution of the death penalty” noting that Portugal was a pioneer in abolishing it “precisely 150 years ago.” Portugal has called for the death penalty to be abolished in Equatorial Guinea, a country which joined the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries (CPLP), in 2014, ba...

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 f...