PPP seeks abolition of death penalty

Farhatullah Babar argues various Islamic countries had placed moratorium on executions of death sentence

ISLAMABAD:

The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) on Tuesday called for abolishing the death penalty, stressing that the number of crimes carrying capital punishment be drastically decreased and juveniles and mentally challenged persons be spared from execution.

The party made the demand on the on the eve of ‘World Day Against Death Penalty’.

“Until the death penalty is abolished as a result of a larger public debate on the efficacy of death penalty in deterring crime, the victims be given right to proper defence and protected against torture for extracting confession,” a statement issued by Human Rights Cell President and former PPP senator Farhatullah Babar noted.

The statement demanded that the number of crimes carrying the death penalty must be drastically decreased from the present 33 and juveniles and mentally challenged persons be spared from execution.

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It further sought legal and consular services for migrant Pakistani workers and streamlining of the procedure for mercy petitions against executions.

Referring to studies, the PPP leader observed that Pakistan executed only the poorest and the “most marginalized” whose fair trial rights were violated, noting that convicts were tortured in the broken criminal justice system.

He recalled that two brothers accused of murder were acquitted by the Supreme Court after years of being on death row but only after they were executed.

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It is shameful that in such a broken criminal justice system the Senate committee recently passed a private member bill calling for public hangings, Babar said, and called for immediate withdrawal of the proposed amendment.

The PPP leader reminded that there was a public outcry to hang the terrorists after the APS massacre in December 2014. However, over 85 per cent of the executions carried out thereafter were for ordinary crimes and not related to terrorism, he said.

He observed that several Muslim countries had placed moratorium on executions, adding that in Pakistan the number of crimes carrying the death penalty had “progressively increased”.