Innocent people will be executed in the United States if the country’s capital punishment system is not reformed, warns a new report.

These reforms include improving the use of forensic science, taping confessions, and providing better trained counsel to defendants. These suggestions were among 39 recommendations released Wednesday in a report by the Constitution Project, a nonpartisan group working to improve the U.S. criminal justice system."If this [Constitution Project report] had been in place before I went to trial, I probably would not have gone to death row.” -- Anthony Graves

The report’s authors, collectively known as the Death Penalty Committee, include both supporters and opponents of the death penalty. The publication comes as the United States, one of just 43 countries that haven’t outlawed capital punishment, is in the midst of one of its largest national discussions on the issue in years.

More than 30 states in the United States continue to allow the death penalty, despite findings that the capital punishment system appears to be biased against minorities – and despite dozens of known cases of innocent people being sentenced to death. Since 1973, over 140 people have been exonerated from “death row”, but critics say it is impossible to tell how many of the 1400 who have been executed may have been innocent.

“Most disturbingly, there is evidence that defendants have been put to death despite significant questions regarding their innocence, undermining confidence in the entire criminal justice system,” the report states.

“There can no longer be any doubt that innocent people do get convicted of horrific crimes, spend years in prison and even face execution. Wrongful convictions undermine society’s confidence in the ability of the criminal justice system to perform its most basic function – to convict the guilty and acquit the innocent.”

The report comes just a week after a botched execution in the Midwestern state of Oklahoma. A prisoner named Clayton Lockett was scheduled to die by lethal injection, but the deadly chemicals were erroneously injected into his flesh.

The procedure reportedly drug out for almost half an hour, during which the conscious Lockett writhed in pain, according to his lawyer.

The Death Penalty Committee is recommending a single-dose injection, rather than the three drugs that Oklahoma and most other states currently use. The committee would also require that the federal government approve the drug or drugs used – a potentially important new issue given that states across the country are currently experimenting with new drugs, after pharmaceutical companies have started refusing to supply their products for lethal injections.

The horrific story has re-ignited a broad public conversation here. Yet advocates that work with the issue say that, while it is good to have the public’s attention on this issue, the more important concerns involve judicial mistakes.

“Despite the Oklahoma execution, I think the more important recommendations [in the new report] have to do with mistakes of innocence,” Richard Dieter, the executive director of Death Penalty Information Center, a clearinghouse, told IPS.

“Recommendations about improving the quality of counsel, the forensics, the DNA testing, the testing of evidence, the videotaping of suspects who are sometimes pressured into confessing something they did not want to do … these are the kinds of things that could help prevent wrongful convictions on death row and possibly wrongful executions.”

Fatal mistakes

Just this week, a federally funded study found that a minimum of four percent of prisoners on death row in the United States are innocent, according to research published Monday in the scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Although small, any number above zero represents an innocent person sentenced to death, like Anthony Graves. Graves was convicted in 1994 for murder and sentenced to death based on testimony supplied only by the other convicted murderer, Robert Carter.

Before his own execution, Carter repeatedly admitted that Graves was not involved, but the process of re-investigation took years. Finally, in 2010, Graves was exonerated and released.

“We’re never ever going to stop killing innocent people as long as we have the penalty,” Graves said Wednesday at a panel discussion here.

“But if this”, he continued, holding up a copy of the Constitution Project report, “had been in place before I went to trial, I probably would not have gone to death row.”

Potentially of help to Graves would have been a report recommendation on videotaping custodial interrogations. Following such a procedure, proponents say, would reduce the risk of false confessions – and provide juries with the context of confessions provided.

Another series of suggestions detail how to improve the use of forensic science in providing evidence.

Mark White, a former governor of Texas and co-chair of the Death Penalty Committee, described Wednesday the forensics police department in Houston, where “leaks in the ceiling contaminated samples and people were not qualified to do the sampling.”

According to a 2011 study, over 50 percent of the first 250 people exonerated by DNA testing were convicted based on forensic mistakes.

Another problem are inadequately trained attorneys.

Mark Earley, a former attorney general of Virginia, described how he was appointed fresh out of law school to represent a defendant on trial for his life. Earley said he also witnessed incompetent representation repeatedly during his time as attorney general, when he oversaw 36 executions in three and a half years.

“For someone who is a ‘small government’ conservative, why did I believe the government always gets it right?” he askedWednesday.

“It’s not about being for or against the death penalty. But it’s about saying that if there is a death penalty, the trial process should be fair.”

Slow reform

Some say the political climate in the U.S. is ripe for reform on the issue of capital punishment. Following the botched execution in Oklahoma, last week President Barack Obama requested that Attorney General Eric Holder review the application of the death penalty throughout the country.

“In the application of the death penalty in this country, we have seen significant problems – racial bias, uneven application of the death penalty … situations in which there were individuals on death row who later on were discovered to have been innocent because of exculpatory evidence,” Obama told reporters. “And all these, I think, do raise significant questions about how the death penalty is being applied.”

Experts in the field say that reform is likely, but only after a long and slow process.

“Unfortunately the death penalty is immersed in a political ballet,” the Death Penalty Information Center’s Dieter told IPS.

“I think the death penalty is actually declining by dramatic levels, and that will probably continue. It is not serving people well: it is expensive and it is picking out those who happen to be poor and minorities.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in a live interview with Iranian TV on Apr. 29, 2014. Courtesy of President Rouhani's official website

By Sussan Tahmasebi
WASHINGTON, May 2 2014 (IPS)

While enjoying unprecedented successes in international relations, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani seems to be suffering a stalemate when it comes to building trust and cooperation between different factions in the Iranian state. As a result, he seems plagued by continuous human rights disasters at home, while issuing no public condemnations. 

Indeed, during an official event he held to mark Labour Day on May 1, wherein he encouraged citizens to set up organisations to advocate for their rights, approximately 25 labour activists were arrested in Tehran.Iranians, increasingly weary and angry, are holding their government and officials accountable.

The detained included members of Tehran’s bus trade union, who had gathered outside the Ministry of Labour to offer the public sweets and flowers.

Prior to this event, during a live state television interview Tuesday, Rouhani vowed that he has not forgotten his 2013 presidential campaign promises. This vague declaration was interpreted by many as a reference to the continued house arrest, without charge or trial, of 2009 presidential candidates, Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi.

During that same interview, Mousavi was rushed to the hospital with reported heart problems.

Mousavi’s ailments, which have been ongoing during his detention, came on the heels of another human rights crisis in Iran.

On Apr. 17, prison officials and security forces stormed the men’s “Ward 350,” at Evin prison in Tehran, where a number of political prisoners are being held.

According to reports, the prisoners were beaten violently, many were moved to solitary confinement, and some had their heads shaved to humiliate them.

The prisoners and their families claim that those in need of serious medical attention have yet to receive proper care in an equipped medical facility.

Despite the fact that government spokesperson, Mohammad Bagher Nobakht, announced that an investigation was underway, Rouhani and his administration have been largely silent on the issue, refusing to publicly condemn the prison raid. 

This silence extends to other human rights issues, such as the high rate of executions in Iran.

Observers and analysts agree that Rouhani has little influence over other branches of government, including the judiciary, which is responsible for stays in execution, overseeing courts and prisons, and issuing early prison releases.

There is much speculation on the reasons behind this lack of coordination between Rouhani and other branches of government on a variety of issues, including human rights.

Some analysts believe that the stepping up of executions since Rouhani took office is intended to embarrass and weaken his position on national and international stages.

Others, such as Isa Saharkhiz, a political analyst and journalist, have offered a different analysis.

In a recent article published on the Paris-based Rooz Online, this former political prisoner argues that the raid and recent arrests are intended to send a message from hardliners to Iranian dissidents, saying that while international relations may be changing, domestic policies will remain the same and little dissent will be tolerated.

In his election campaign, Rouhani repeatedly promised to ease the impact of Iran’s security state on citizens, and while in office, has welcomed constructive criticism and encouraged Iranians abroad to return home.

However, despite his new approach to Iranian human rights, throughout these many crises, Rouhani has refused to publicly and clearly condemn the actions of hardline groups, opting instead for a quiet, diplomatic approach to solving problems.

He alluded to this approach in his televised interview, when he stated that he has started a process of peacebuilding and reconciliation both internationally and nationally.

He also claimed that he is “committed to his campaign promises but realising them will take time.”

But patience is wearing thin among Rouhani’s critics and supporters.

Many are angry at the slow pace of change and the continued repression and rights abuses in Iran.

While Rouhani, hardliners and reformers engage in a battle of wills and shows of strength, the Iranian public is reaching its own understanding on human rights.

Iranians, increasingly weary and angry, are holding their government and officials accountable.

Last week, when families of prisoners in Ward 350 were staging a protest outside the presidential offices to demand an investigation into the prison raid, something strange and unexpected happened.

The incident was widely reported on social media.

One account reported: “Today while the families of prisoners were outside the president’s office, a group of women approached and pulled out a banner that read: ‘We want an end to executions’ and began chanting their demands.”

These women were relatives of prisoners who had been sentenced to death because of petty drug dealing, according to other accounts.

The women had come to the office of the president to demand justice and to prevent the execution of their sons.

According to a Facebook report, “the women were very direct and forward in expressing their demands…unlike any human rights activist. One of the women asked: ‘they want us to have more children, so they can execute them?’”

“They went on to complain about their poor economic situation, which forced their children to turn to selling drugs,” continued the report. “[T]hey lamented that they have no money to feed their families and that their utilities had been turned off.”

The understanding that the public has reached on human rights issues demonstrates a serious rift between the state and the public.

Across the country, Iranians, including family members of death-row inmates, disenfranchised youth from ethnic-minority communities, and the working poor, are rapidly changing their view of and approach toward the state in their demand for human rights.

The state, however, seems unwilling to respond to these demands.

While this boiling-point situation may be the legacy of the Ahmadinejad era, or those who have come before him, it is still a legacy that President Rouhani must address.

These demands will likely, if left unanswered, prove problematic for moderates like Rouhani, and the hardliners who prefer swift reprisals.

Since his June 2013 election, Rouhani’s concentrated efforts have achieved considerable success in reforming Iran’s image internationally.

When under pressure, Rouhani often strategically boasts about holding a legitimate mandate from the Iranian “public.”

So far, though, Rouhani’s efforts at national reconciliation have been narrowly focused on peacebuilding between political foes — hardliners and reformers — rather than the public.

This effort has been carried out in silence and behind closed doors.

To be successful national reconciliation needs to include a broader segment of the Iranian population.

Rouhani should take cues on his successes internationally and begin building trust with the “public” that seems to have been forgotten.

This trust-building must extend beyond economic reforms.

Solving Iran’s human rights situation should be seen by Rouhani as a critical strategy for ensuring national and human security in Iran.

Sussan Tahmasebi is an Iranian women’s rights activist, who lived and worked in Iran between 1999 and 2010. She is the co-founder of the International Civil Society Action Network (ICAN), where she serves as the Director of the MENA/Asia programme on women’s rights, peace and security.

U.N. Special Rapporteur Ahmed Shaheed presents his report to the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Mar. 14, 2014. Courtesy of Mr. Shaheed's office.

By Omid Memarian
GENEVA, Mar 14 2014 (IPS)

Following the release Friday of his report to the Human Rights Council on the situation in Iran, U.N. Special Rapporteur Ahmed Shaheed urged Tehran to engage with U.N. mandates – firstly by permitting him to enter the country.

“Nobody has been able to go to Iran as a U.N. mandate-holder for nine years now,” Shaheed told IPS in Geneva, Switzerland, where the council is based."Personal attacks are nothing new...just think what Iranian citizens in Tehran or elsewhere might get if they speak out.” -- Ahmed Shaheed

“The next step would be Iran engaging with my mandate or if they wish with the other mandates as well,” said Shaheed, who was appointed to his post in June 2011 and has issued two earlier reports.

The 104-page report is based primarily on interviews with 72 Iranians living in three European countries in December 2013 and 61 statements by Iranians inside Iran and Turkey between September and December 2013.

The special rapporteur also examined reports compiled by organisations focusing on ethnic and religious minority rights in Iran.

While welcoming “positive overtures” made by the Iranian government since Hassan Rouhani became president in August 2013, the report states “they currently do not address fully the fundamental human rights concerns” raised by the U.N. and other human rights-focused bodies.

An estimated 1,539 individuals have been executed, including at least 955 for drug trafficking, since the establishment of the special rapporteur’s mandate in 2011, according to the report.

Some 687 individuals are also believed to have been executed in 2013, 369 of which were announced by official or semi-official government sources.

At least 57 individuals were publicly hanged (one of whom was pardoned after surviving the execution), including at least 28 women, in 2013, according to the report.

In addition to focusing on allegations of the abuse and imprisonment of activists, ethnic and religious minorities and members of the press, the special rapporteur estimates that 900 political prisoners are currently being held in Iranian jails.

Sarah Leah Whitson, the executive director for Middle East & North Africa at Human Rights Watch, told IPS the report’s “findings are consistent with what we’ve been documenting in Iran.

“If Rouhani really wants to make an impression as a leader who is serious about reform in Iran, the first thing he should do is call for a moratorium on executions,” she said.

“The gruesome numbers in a patently unfair justice system cry out for careful review and scrutiny of the evidence against all those facing death sentences in Iran,” added Whitson.

On Wednesday, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Rouhani has not delivered on his human rights promises after the release of his own report on Iranian human rights to the General Assembly.

His remarks were met with sharp condemnation from Tehran.

Ali Akbar Velayati, an advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called Ban “the weakest secretary-general [in the history] of the U.N.”

Speaker of the Iranian Parliament Ali Larijani said the report was “dictated by Mossad and the CIA.”

Ban also called for Iran to allow Shaheed, who previously served two terms as the foreign minister of the Maldives, to visit Iran and investigate the charges that have been laid against it.

Last January, when a draft of the special rapporteur’s report was presented to Iran for feedback, Iran’s judiciary head Sadegh Larijani publicly spoke about the report, which violated a U.N. protocol requiring Iran to keep the report confidential until its release to the Human Rights Council.

“It is clear to all that preparing biased reports about the situation of human rights in Iran is aimed to exert more pressure on the Islamic Republic, and the Westerners don’t really have any human rights concerns,” said Larijani at a meeting of high-ranking judicial officials.

“Personal attacks are nothing new,” Shaheed told IPS, adding that “If a U.N. mandate holder, or the U.N. secretary-general, or other officials can be attacked so much for what they say, just think what Iranian citizens in Tehran or elsewhere might get if they speak out.”

“Iran is much better served if it engages in a debate,” he said.

The special rapporteur’s findings criticise the Iranian Supreme Leader’s extensive influence on the judiciary and the fact that his judgments can supersede judicial rulings.

The report also states that most reported violations of human rights in Iran occur during pre-trial stages, in detention centres or in court.

“The situation in Iran is not as bleak as Mr. Shaheed reflects in his report, but so long as there is no constructive dialogue between the two sides, nothing can be resolved,” a member of the Iranian delegation who asked not to be named told IPS.

The judiciary is constitutionally independent from the executive branch in Iran, but since the election of Rouhani, who campaigned on a platform of moderation, there has been a growing expectation for him to implement reforms.

But apart from the release of 80 political prisoners last year under Rouhani’s watch, which is noted by the report, hardline conservatives who dominate the Judiciary and the security establishment have shown little flexibility on the issue of reforms .

“Every country has issues, and Iran has a large share of that and it should address it by engagement,” Shaheed told IPS.

The Human Rights Council will vote on the renewal of his mandate following the report’s review on Mar. 17.

The lethal injection room at San Quentin State Prison, completed in 2010. Credit: California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation

By Ramy Srour
WASHINGTON, Oct 9 2013 (IPS)

Authorities in the southern state of Texas are refusing to return lethal injection drugs purchased from two compounding pharmacies, despite calls from the firms not to use their substances for executions.

The move comes after foreign drug companies have largely stopped exporting drugs for lethal injections to the United States, forcing those U.S. states that still impose death penalties to look to domestic compounding pharmacies to supply them with the required drugs.

According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), pharmacy compounding is a practice in which a licensed pharmacist combines, mixes, or alters a drug’s ingredients to create a medication specifically tailored to the needs of an individual patient.

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s (DCJ) refusal has to do with the drug pentobarbital, a substance usually administered as an animal anaesthetic and as a remedy for epilepsy and seizures in humans. The move comes only a few days after one of the two companies involved, Woodlands Compounding Pharmacy (WCP), had expressly requested that the drugs be returned.

“The drugs were purchased legally and we were upfront with the vendors that their names would be subject to public disclosures after the purchase,” Texas DCJ’s spokesman Jason Clark told IPS. “We are not going to return the drugs.”

Clark declined to offer any additional comments, as the issue is currently at the centre of litigation in Texas.

Calls by IPS to WCP for comment were not returned by deadline. However, in an Oct. 4 letter, the owner and pharmacist-in-charge of WCP demanded that the DCJ “immediately return the vials of compounded pentobarbital in exchange for a refund”. According to the company, the sale, which saw WCP providing the State of Texas with eight doses of pentobarbital, took place because Texas had misrepresented the facts.

“Based on the phone calls I had with [the Texas] DCJ, it was my belief that this information would be kept on the ‘down low’ and that it was unlikely that it would be discovered that my pharmacy provided these drugs,” WCP’s Jasper Lovoi wrote. “Now that the information has been made public, I find myself in the middle of a firestorm that I was not advised of and did not bargain for.”

The letter is now being used as evidence in a lawsuit that was filed last week in Texas, challenging the execution of three prisoners on death row.

The other company involved in the controversy, Pharmacy Innovation, has also denied any knowledge of the drugs’ purpose. The company said that it was “completely unaware that the drugs … were purchased with the intent to use them for lethal injections,” according to a new report by the U.K.-based Reprieve, an advocacy group.

As soon as it was informed, the company reportedly cancelled the order before it could be filled.

Asked for comment, Pharmacy Innovation referred IPS to David Ball, of the Ball Consulting Group, LLC, a health communications firm affiliated with the International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists (IACP), a trade association.

“Although it’s true that compounding pharmacies have been approached by some states to provide them with substances that would assist them in certain government practices, we should remember that drugs such as pentobarbital cover only a very small part of what compounding pharmacies do,” Ball told IPS.

“In fact, they represent a miniscule and infinitesimal part of the drugs produced by compounding pharmacies,” he said.

Ball declined to comment on the controversy between the Texas DCJ and Woodlands Compounding Pharmacy.

A new lethal mix

U.S. states turned to compounding pharmacies for drugs for lethal injections only as recently as 2011. That was necessary after drug companies stopped selling sodium thiopental (ST), the substance previously used for executions in the United States.

These drug companies, most based outside the United States, reported facing legal obstacles because of the unconstitutionality of death penalty in their home countries.

The Italy-based Hospira, for instance, announced in 2011 that it would stop producing the drug altogether. The British government, too, banned the export of ST.

That same year, the Denmark-based Lundbeck announced that it would “deny distribution of [pentobarbital] to prisons in U.S. states currently active in carrying out the death penalty by lethal injection.”

So far, the domestic compounding industry has offered a viable alternative to U.S. states still carrying out the death penalty. Texas, Pennsylvania, Colorado and South Dakota, for instance, currently rely on compounding pharmacies for their supply of pentobarbital.

But the recent developments in Texas suggest that this trend may be short-lived.

Death penalty opponents are pushing the U.S. FDA to outlaw the practice of compounding pentobarbital. Thus far, however, the agency has refused to do so, noting only that the broader practice of compounding is currently under scrutiny.

“Pharmacy compounding can serve an important public health need if a patient cannot be treated with an FDA-approved medication,” the agency says. For instance, if a patient needs a medication made without a certain dye because of an allergy, pharmacy compounding can be an important solution.

Nonetheless, the industry’s involvement with the production of pentobarbital has clearly become a point of significant concern for the compounding sector.

Meanwhile, the State of Texas is proceeding with the Wednesday night execution of Michael Yowell, a plaintiff in the Texas litigation, for the murder of his parents in 1998.

Covenants Watch Convenor Kao Yung-cheng speaks to reporters in Taipei City on Dec. 27, 2012. Protestors’ posters read “Illegal Murders Are Not Justice”. Credit: Dennis Engbarth/IPS

By Dennis Engbarth
TAIPEI, Jan 8 2013 (IPS)

Taiwanese activists and human rights advocates ushered in the New Year with a push to prevent a return to authoritarianism and defend procedural justice for death row prisoners in the wake of six executions just before Christmas.

Rights lawyers say they “do not exclude” filing criminal charges against Justice Minister Tseng Yung-fu in addition to filing a petition calling for his impeachment for “illegally” ordering the execution of six death row convicts who had been handed death sentences, confirmed by the Taiwan Supreme Court, for a total of eight murders.

The men were executed on Dec. 21 by pistol shots to the head and heart in three prisons across Taiwan, without prior notification to families or lawyers.

The incident brought the total number of persons executed by the current government to 19. President Ma Ying-jeou of the ruling Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang or KMT) broke a five-year moratorium on death penalty executions, begun by the previous Democratic Progressive Party administration, with four executions on Apr. 30, 2010.

A total of 55 convicts remain on death row.

The executions were the third set carried out since the Taiwan government ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) in March 2009 and incorporated the content of the two treaties into domestic law through an implementation act effective December 10, 2009 .

The European Union and international and domestic human rights groups denounced the executions.

European Commission Vice President Catherine Ashton deplored the executions and called on Taipei to take concrete steps toward reducing the use of capital punishment to allow the resumption of a de facto moratorium.

Amnesty International East Asia Director Roseann Rife termed the action cold-blooded killing by the Taiwan authorities.

The KMT government’s decision to carry out the executions overrode an appeal by a panel of prominent international human rights professionals slated to review Taiwan’s compliance with the two covenants in late February 2013.

Manfred Nowak, former United Nations special rapporteur on torture, and Eibe Riedel, joint expert committee member of the U.N. Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, issued a joint letter on Nov. 21 last year calling on Ma to refrain from carrying out any more executions before the February review.

According to Tseng, the ministry of justice (MOJ) had no choice but to carry out the executions after the prime suspect in a child murder sparked public outrage by claiming he knew he would not be executed and could enjoy a life in prison.

Tseng also declared that the MOJ has never promised to terminate the death penalty.

Shortly after the incident, a coalition of Taiwan human rights organisations submitted an impeachment motion against Tseng to the Control Yuan, the branch of government responsible for monitoring malfeasance by government officials.

The petition, filed in person with Control Yuan Commissioner Yeh Yao-peng by Covenants Watch convenor Kao Yung-cheng, charged that Tseng’s signature on the execution orders on Dec. 20 violated Article 6-4 of the ICCPR, which has been ratified by this country and given effect in domestic law by the Implementation Act.

The petition added that the ICCPR article mandates that “anyone sentenced to death shall have the right to seek pardon or commutation of the sentence”.

Kao related that the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty (TAEDP) had helped 44 death row convicts, including the six executed December 21, to submit formal petitions for amnesty, pardon or commutation of sentence to President Ma on Mar. 29, 2010.

The president gave no indication that he approved or rejected the petitions, Kao told IPS.

In its Dec. 21 statement, the MOJ said the executions had been carried out in accordance with existing law, including the Amnesty Act, which does not specify a procedure for petitions.

However, Kao told IPS that the Implementation Act grants the covenants “priority application” over other laws, a principle reaffirmed by Ma himself in a Dec. 18 news conference.

Therefore, Tseng was legally required to respect the right of petition for amnesty by “first certifying that the president had already rejected appeals for amnesty before carrying out” the executions, Kao said.

The petition concluded that the justice minister committed a grave violation of law and abuse of authority and asked the Control Yuan to impeach Tseng.

Kao told IPS that the impeachment petition is distinct from the question of abolition but instead concerns procedural justice.

If people can be executed, regardless of the reasons, without authorities fulfilling the required legal process, Taiwan will be put back on the road to authoritarianism, Kao warned.

He also told IPS that human rights groups are discussing filing criminal charges against Tseng, who could be liable for punishment under Article 127 of the Criminal Code with up to five years’ imprisonment.

Ironically, while the MOJ claims that public polls showed an overwhelming majority in favour of the death penalty, most citizens lack confidence in the judicial process itself.

A poll of 1,073 adults conducted by the Taiwan Thinktank in mid December showed that 64.4 percent believed the judiciary had been “unfair” in its judgements during 2012, compared with just 21.4 percent who believed the justice system was “fair”.

Activists also warned that the executions could further undermine the quality of the judicial process.

Academica Institution for Jurispurdence Deputy Research Fellow Liao Fu-teh told IPS that “the death penalty may be being used as a tool of intimidation”.

Liao cited media reports on Dec. 23, 2012, which related that a suspect being detained for questioning in Hualien in eastern Taiwan in connection with the murder of her mother had been “frightened” by the executions and, after months of denials, confessed to committing the killing with her boyfriend, to avoid being executed.

Criticism of the apparent lack of official respect for the two covenants intensified during 2012.

On Dec. 10 last year, a coalition of civil society, labour, environmental and social movement organisations awarded Ma a paper plaque for “stomping on human rights” just as Ma was presenting an “Asian Democracy and Human Rights Award” to the Thailand-based ECPAT International in Taipei’s Far East Plaza Hotel.

(END)

One day after voting against a United Nations General Assembly draft resolution seeking to abolish the death penalty, India executed Pakistani national Mohammad Ajmal Kasab for the November 2008 terror rampage in Mumbai that left 166 people dead.

Kasab was executed Wednesday morning by hanging – the approved method for carrying out the death penalty in India. He was the sole survivor of a ten-man squad of armed militants who landed in Mumbai harbour on a terror mission after sailing out from the Pakistani port city of Karachi.

While the other nine were killed in firefights with Indian security forces, Kasab was pinned down and disarmed by policemen.

After pictures of him – snapped as he attacked Mumbai’s main railway station – were circulated around the world, he emerged as the face of the massacre, and a test of India’s capital punishment policy.

The country’s Supreme Court had, in 1983, ruled that the death penalty should be imposed only in “the rarest of rare cases.” Kasab was the first person to be executed since 2004.

Speaking to members of the press on Wednesday India’s foreign minister Salman Khurshid said Kasab’s was “certainly a rarest of the rare case”. He described the execution as a “sober, sombre duty that had to be carried out”.

In India, capital crimes, or crimes that merit the death sentence, include murder, gang robbery involving murder, and terrorist activities. Hanging sentences are carried out only after appeals are duly heard in higher courts and clemency denied by the government.

After Kasab’s 2010 death sentence was upheld by India’s Supreme Court, the case went before President Pranab Mukherjee who, following advice from the cabinet as is customary, denied clemency on Nov. 5, clearing the way for Wednesday’s execution.

On Tuesday, India had joined 39 other countries in voting against the General Assembly draft calling for a non-binding moratorium on executions, after insisting that every country had the sovereign right to frame its own legal system.

The draft resolution was adopted by the U.N. Third Committee on social and humanitarian issues with an overwhelming 110 countries voting in favour and 36 abstaining.

“It is unfortunate that India has voted against the moratorium, since this is a country that is capable of promoting progressive and liberal ideas in global forums,” Maja Daruwala, a leading campaigner against the death penalty, told IPS.

Daruwala, executive director of the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, a New Delhi-based international non-governmental organisation, said, “India should be leading the movement for the realisation of a compassionate global society.”

Considering that several older death row cases are still under consideration for grant of clemency, Kasab’s case appears to have been disposed of quickly.

There are, according to the home ministry, 14 mercy petition cases now pending before the government, including that of Mohammed Afzal Guru, condemned for his role in the December 2001 terror attack on India’s parliament building.

Guru’s lawyer, Colin Gonsalves, says Kasab’s relatively quick hanging may have an effect on other pending death row cases in India.

“There should not be any death sentence at all, but Kasab’s was an extreme case,” Gonsalves, founder of the New Delhi-based Human Rights Law Network (HRLN) told IPS.

“Kasab’s case is a significant setback for the move towards complete abolition of the death penalty in India,” Prof. Anup Surendranath at the National Law University of New Delhi wrote in an opinion piece in The Hindu newspaper on Sep. 17.

“A profoundly hurt and grieving society, the guilt of the accused established through damning photographs and videos, wounded nationalism and the possible involvement of state actors across the border all contributed towards making Kasab’s case a strong validation of the need for the death penalty,” he wrote.

Gonsalves said he does not see India agreeing to any U.N. moratorium on the death penalty.

Human rights activists like Gonsalves and Daruwala are also concerned at the arbitrary application of the death penalty in the country – as borne out by an analysis of cases between 1950 and 2006 carried out by Amnesty International (AI) – and also by too many erroneous judgements.

In August, a group of 14 former judges sought the intervention of President Mukherjee to commute death sentences passed on 13 convicts, currently incarcerated in different jails across the country, on the grounds of erroneous judgements.

In their appeal the judges pointed out that the Supreme Court had itself admitted that at least seven of the sentences were awarded ‘per incuriam’ (out of error or ignorance) and did not fall in the “rarest of rare” category.

“Executions of persons wrongly sentenced to death will severely undermine the credibility of the criminal justice system and the authority of the state to carry out such punishments in future,” the appeal to the president said.