Independent UK: America and the world's executioners join to block UN moves to end death penalty [View All]

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America and the world's executioners join efforts to block UN moves to end death penalty
By Anne Penketh, Diplomatic Editor
Published: 15 November 2007



In China, a death sentence means a bullet in the back of the head. In Iran, it means death by hanging. In Saudi Arabia, the victim is beheaded by the sword.

World public opinion has been so outraged by the continued use of the death penalty in the 25 countries that carried out executions last year, that a petition carrying five million signatures has been presented to the UN, where yesterday a small group of countries were attempting to block the historic vote on a global moratorium that could lead to an all-out ban.

The UN initiative is the brainchild of Italy, where the association Hands off Cain, campaigning for an end to the death penalty, convinced Prime Minister Romano Prodi to push for an end to the death sentence after the botched and humiliating hanging of the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein last year.

If last-minute "killer" amendments to a draft UN resolution do not scupper the initiative, the 192-nation UN human rights committee will begin voting on the measure today. If adopted, it will give a powerful moral boost to those campaigning for an end to the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment.

As of last night, the draft resolution had been sponsored by 85 states, including all 27 European Union nations. The United States, which executed 53 people last year, will vote against. So will China, which put 2,790 people to death last year. In fact 91 per cent of all death sentences carried out happen in six countries: China, the US, Pakistan, Sudan, Iraq and Iran, where two men were publicly hanged for murder and robbery yesterday.

"The death penalty is abhorrent and a grave abuse of human rights," said Amnesty International's death penalty expert, Piers Bannister, who believes that a global moratorium is "long overdue". "In the overwhelming number of cases around the world a prisoner will be executed after receiving an unfair trial in violation of international laws and standards," he said. "Capital punishment is always cruel and unnecessary, it doesn't deter crime and runs the risk of executing the innocent."

At the UN, Singapore has led the charge against the draft resolution, which calls on all states still maintaining the death sentence to respect a moratorium "with a view to abolishing the death penalty". The text urges them to "progressively restrict the use of the death penalty" and calls upon the 130 states which have abolished the ultimate penalty not to reintroduce it. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/article3160630.ece