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DEATH PENALTY REPORT – JANUARY – FEBRUARY 2018Date format: day/month/yearInternational Update (19.1.18 – 8.2.18)Uganda – 19.1.18 – Amnesty has responded to President Yoweri Museveni’s threat to ‘hang’ death row prisoners as misguided since there is no credible evidence that the death penalty acts as a deterrent but is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment and a violation of the right to life. More than 10 years have since the last execution in Uganda. (Source: Amnesty International.)Iraq – Reports indicate that an unnamed German woman, believed to be of Moroccan descent, has been sentenced to death after she ran away to join Isis. The Court in Baghdad convicted her of ‘providing logistical support and assistance to the terrorist group to commit crimes’. (Source: The Independent)Egypt – 24.1.18 – A published list of offences carrying the death penalty includes joining the armed forces of a state at war with Egypt, attempted espionage with a foreign country, attacking the country’s military operations, ’hurting its morality’, in times of war providing money, equipment, training or facilities to the enemy state, forming an armed group to forcibly change the constitution or overthrow the regime, forming armed gangs for the purposes of looting, pillage, and plunder, and using explosives with the purposes of political killing, terrorising people or hindering the police. (Source: Egypt Today.)Lesotho – 23.1.18 – An Urgent Action Update was received confirming that a Military Court Martial had acquitted 22 Lesotho Defence Force (LDF) soldiers of mutiny charges on 18th December 2017. A High Court had ordered a permanent stay of prosecution for a further soldier a month earlier. The 23 soldiers had been charged with mutiny in 2015. If convicted, they would have faced the death penalty. (Source AIUK).USAWashington State – 25.1.18 – A Senate Committee has approved by 4-3 a measure to abolish the death penalty in Washington State. The measure would remove capital punishment as a sentencing option for aggravated murder, and mandate a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. The Bill will now move on to the Rules Committee. Note: A moratorium on the death penalty has been in place since 2014. (Source: Associated Press.)Utah – 30.1.18 –A lawmaker has called for the killing of a security guard or paramedic to carry the death penalty, but prosecutors have warned that this might – in line with other States – result in capital punishment being thrown out if the list of applicable crimes became too long. Utah law already has 60 aggravating factors that can invoke the death penalty. (Source: US News.) Iowa – 30.1.17 – A bill to allow those convicted of first degree murder to be face execution by lethal injection has its first reading by the House of Representatives on 1st February. If the proposal becomes law, it will reverse a 50-year ban on capital punishment. (Source: Des Moines Register.) 1.2.18 – The Public Safety Committee Chairman has, however, said there are insufficient votes within the Committee in favour to enable this to take place. (Source: WOWT.) South Carolina – A Legislator has announced plans to re-file a bill calling for firing squads to help execute the State’s prisoners on death row. (Source: The State.)Chile – 4.2.18 – Five lawmakers from the far-right have called on the recently elected President Sebastian Pi?era to pass a bill to restore the death penalty. This is in the aftermath of the murder of a baby girl. It is understood, however, the bill would be unlikely to pass as it would require a reform of the Constitution and the abandoning of several Human Rights treaties. (Source: TeleSUR) Iran – 4.2.18 – The Supreme Court upheld a ruling imposing the death penalty on Ahmedreza Djalali, the Iranian-born Swedish-Belgian Professor from the Free University of Brussels. Professor Djalali was charged with espionage and ‘enmity with God’ following – according to his Lawyer – an unfair and corrupt trial. He could be executed at any time. (Source: New Europe.)47625061468000Pakistan – 7.2.18 – A Court has sentenced one person to death for the ‘lynching’ of Mashal Khan (pictured), a University student accused of blasphemy in April 2015. Postings showing the brutality of the attack, involving a large ‘gang’ composed in the main of students, led to wide-spread condemnation. 5 of the accused were given life sentences, 25 received sentences of 3 years, and 26 were acquitted. An official report, released months after the attack, concluded Mr Khan had been falsely accused. (Note: The offence of blasphemy in Pakistan can carry the death penalty but, whereas mere allegations have prompted mob violence and lynchings, no executions have been carried out.) (Source: The Guardian).Urgent ActionsIran – UA 10/18 – Iranian teenager Abolfazi Chezani Sharahi remains at risk of execution after his execution scheduled for 17th January was postponed. Fourteen years old at the time of the crime of which he was convicted, since 2014 he has been transferred to solitary confinement in preparation for his execution four times. (Circulated to DPLWG 22.1.18). (This month’s DP Urgent Action).USA – Alabama – Vernon Madison is scheduled to be executed on 25th January. His lawyers maintain that he lacks a rational understanding of the reason for his execution following a number of severe strokes, which have resulted in dementia and an inability to remember the crime. (Circulated to DPLWG o date of receipt – 22.1.18). 25.1.18 - The US Supreme Court granted a stay of execution to Mr Madison. Bahrain – UA 252/14 (Second Update) – The Court of Cassation has upheld the death sentence imposed on Maher Abbas Ahmad following a trial which found him guilty of the premeditated murder of a policeman, but which relied on ‘confessions’ extracted under torture. If the King ratifies his sentence, he will be at imminent risk of execution. (Circulated to DPLWG 30.1.18.)Iran – UA 171/17 – Ramin Hossein Panahi, an Iranian Kurdish prisoner, has been on hunger strike since 27th January after a grossly unfair trial that followed 4 months of enforced disappearance. He has been sentenced to death in connection with his membership of the armed Kurdish opposition group, Komala. (Circulated to DPLWG 5.2.18.)Belarus – UA17/18 – Viachaslau Sukharko and Aliaksandr Zhylnikau, found guilty of murdering three people, were initially sentenced to life imprisonment, but a re-trial has resulted in the death sentence for both. If, as is likely, the Supreme Court upholds the sentences and a presidential pardon is denied, both will be at risk of imminent execution. (Circulated to DPLWG 5.2.18.) CampaigningAnti-Death Penalty Project – No further information has been received. The Project is expected to ‘go live’ following the AIUK AGM in April.08 February 2018 ................
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