China, USA among top five in giving capital punishment to criminals – Amnesty International Report 2011 on death penalty

China, USA among top five in giving capital punishment to criminals
– Amnesty International Report 2011 on death penalty

amnesty international is a global movement of more than 3 million supporters,
members and activists in more than 150 countries and territories who campaign
to end grave abuses of human rights


Amnesty International was founded in year 1961.
That time ten countries including West Germany abolished death penalty.
1977 Amnesty International won Nobel Prize.
One very interesting fact about this 1977 is that Amnesty International took up death penalty abolition as its one of main goal. Same Year after ten years of Gap America started death punishment.

The organization began its global campaign against the death penalty in 1977. At that time only 16 countries had abolished capital punishment.
More than thirty years later, 139 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or in practice. Fifty-eight countries are now classified as retentionist and far fewer use it.

Currently A total of 31 countries abolished the death penalty in law or in practice during the last 10 years but China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, the USA and Yemen remain amongst the most frequent executioners, some in direct contradiction of international human rights law.

The total number of executions officially recorded by Amnesty International in 2010 went down from at least 714 people in 2009 to at least 527 in 2010, excluding China.

China is believed to have executed thousands in 2010 but continues to maintain its secrecy over its use of the death penalty.

China used the death penalty in 2010 against thousands of people for a wide range of crimes that include non-violent offences and after proceedings that did not meet international fair trial standards.

Two regions are responsible for most executions worldwide: Asia and the Middle East.

Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and the United Arab Emirates ignored international prohibitions in 2010 and imposed death sentences on individuals that were below 18 years of age when the crimes were committed.

In the USA, the only country in the Americas to carry out executions, at least 110 death sentences were imposed during 2010 but this represents only about a third of the number handed down in the mid-1990s. And in March 2011, Illinois became the 16th state to abolish the death penalty.

In 2010 Amnesty International was not able to confirm comprehensive figures on the use of the death penalty for China, Malaysia, North Korea, Singapore and Viet Nam although executions were known to have been carried out in all these countries.

Available information from five other countries in the region confirmed at least 82 executions were carried out in Asia.

Eleven countries imposed death sentences but continued not to carry out executions in 2010: Afghanistan, Brunei Darussalam, India, Indonesia, Laos, Maldives, Myanmar, Pakistan, South Korea, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

The Pacific Islands remained free from death sentences and executions.
In January 2010 the President of Mongolia announced a moratorium on executions with a view to abolition of the death penalty.

After a year’s hiatus in 2009 when for the first time no executions were recorded in Europe and the former Soviet Union, in March 2010 the Belarusian authorities carried out two executions. Three new death sentences were imposed in Belarus in 2010.

Fewer death sentences and executions were recorded in total in the Middle East and North Africa in 2010 than in 2009.

However, where the death penalty was imposed it was frequently used after unfair trials and for offences, such as drug-trafficking or adultery, which are not recognized as the “most serious crimes” and therefore in violation of international law.

The authorities of Algeria, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco/Western Sahara, Tunisia and United Arab Emirates imposed death sentences but continued to refrain from carrying out executions.

The Iranian authorities acknowledged the execution of 252 people, including five women and one juvenile offender in 2010.
At least 10 women and four men remained under sentence of death by stoning in
Iran at the end of the year.

Death sentences continued to be mandatory in Singapore for drug-related offences and
were mostly imposed against foreign nationals.


Amnesty International received credible reports of more than 300 other executions which were not officially acknowledged, mostly in Vakilabad Prison, Mashhad. Most were of people convicted of alleged drugs offences.
Fourteen people were publicly executed. Death sentences continued to be imposed in large numbers.

In 2010 one more African country, Gabon, abolished the death penalty, bringing the number of abolitionist countries among African Union members to 16.

Four countries were known to have executed in sub-Saharan Africa in 2010: Botswana (1), Equatorial Guinea (4), Somalia (at least 8) and Sudan (at least 6).

An Anti-Homosexuality Bill that would, if enacted into law, introduce the death penalty
for “aggravated” homosexuality, was awaiting consideration by the Parliament of Uganda at the end of 2010.

REPORTED EXECUTIONS IN 2010
Bahrain (1),
Bangladesh (9+),
Belarus (2),
Botswana (1),
China (1000s),
Egypt (4),
Equatorial Guinea (4),
Iran (252+),
Iraq (1+),
Japan (2),
Libya (18+),
Malaysia (1+),
North Korea (60+),
the Palestinian Authority (5),
Saudi Arabia (27+),
Singapore (+),
Somalia (8+),
Sudan (6+),
Syria (17+),
Taiwan (4),
United States of
America (46),
Yemen (53+).


Reality Views by sm –
Monday, March 28, 2011

Keywords Tags - Amnesty International , Capital Punishment , Death Penalty , Executions , United States Death Penalty , World capital Punishment News

Sources –
http://www.amnesty.org/en