Death Penalty News

Asad Noor, who is in hiding, says the police have been harassing his family in Chittagong over a Facebook video he posted defending a Buddhist monk. Bngladeshi blogger and secular activist Asaduzzaman Noor, accused of defaming Islam, has claimed that his family at Amtali Upzila of Barguna district (around 320 km south of Dhaka) is being harassed by the government for posting a Facebook video criticising alleged appropriation of a Buddhist temple. Noor, better known by his nom de plume Asad Noor, has been in hiding — in Bangladesh and abroad — for past several years after receiving death threats from Islamist groups for defending a Buddhist monk, and 10 Minute School, a pro-LGBTQ platform. He has been charged under the Digital Security Act, 2018, for defaming Islam — an offence punishable with a jail term of up to 10 years. When the law was implemented, Amnesty International described it as a serious threat to freedom of expression in Bangladesh. Bloggers, social media...

Former Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir and 16 others will appear before a special court of three judges in Khartoum today on charges of carrying out a coup against the elected government in 1989. Moez Hadarah, part of the public prosecution, said: “The defendants are brought to trial under Article 96 of the 1983 Sudanese Criminal Code, which undermines constitutional order and Article 78 of the same Act, namely, participation in the criminal act.” If Al-Bashir is convicted under Article 96, he may face the death penalty, according to the indictment. “We have strong evidence against Al-Bashir,” the prosecution confirmed. “It is the first time in Sudan that a military coup was brought to trial,” he said. The Sudanese army ousted Al-Bashir in April 2019 following popular protests that lasted several months. The most prominent suspects in the case are Al-Bashir’s deputies Ali Osman Taha and Bakri Hassan Saleh, in addition to military and civilian elements who assum...