Amnesty International has called on the Yemeni authorities to halt the imminent execution of a man facing the death penalty for a murder he is alleged to have committed when he was under 18 years old.
Yemeni authorities are reported to have stopped Muhammed Taher Thabet Samoum's prison visits, prompting fears that his execution could be imminent. He was initially scheduled for execution on 12 January but was granted a temporary reprieve by the Attorney General.
"We urge President Ali Abdullah Saleh to show clemency in this case and prevent the state killing of Muhammed Taher Thabet Samoum, a young man accused of a murder committed when he says he was still under 18," said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International's Director for the Middle East and North Africa.
"The death penalty is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment, and it must never be applied to juvenile offenders."
Muhammed Taher Thabet Samoum was sentenced to death in September 2001 by the Criminal Court in Ibb, west Yemen, for a murder he is alleged to have committed in June 1999. He maintains that he was under 18 years old at the time of the alleged offence but does not have a birth certificate.
Another alleged juvenile offender convicted of murder, Fuad Ahmed Ali Abdullah, remains at risk of execution although he was given a temporary reprieve on 18 December 2010, the day before he was due to be executed by firing squad, following the intervention of his lawyer.
He was sentenced to death for a murder committed when he is believed to have been under 18. Yemen's Attorney General is expected to request that his age be determined by a forensic doctor.
"Executing individuals for crimes they are alleged to have committed when they were less than 18 years of age is not only inhumane but also contravenes both Yemeni law Yemen's obligations under international human rights treaties," said Malcolm Smart.
Yemen is a state party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, both of which expressly prohibit the execution of juvenile offenders – those convicted of crimes committed when they were under 18.
Amnesty International is aware of at least eight other people who are possible juvenile offenders on death row in Yemen and has long-standing concerns about the use of the death penalty in the country, particularly as death sentences are often passed after legal proceedings which fail to satisfy international standards for fair trial.
In 2010, at least 51 people were executed in Yemen. At least 2 more people have been executed since the start of this year. Hundreds of people are believed to be under sentence of death.
Source: Amnesty Internatnional, January 18, 2011
Halt Pending Execution of Child Offender
The Yemeni government should immediately halt plans to execute Muhammad Tahir Thabit Samum and revoke his death sentence, Human Rights Watch said today.
Samum is scheduled to be executed as early as January 19, 2011, for a murder he was accused of committing when he said he was still a child. Both Yemeni and international law prohibit imposing the death sentence on individuals who commit crimes while under age 18.
"The Yemeni government should uphold its own laws banning the execution of individuals who committed crimes as children," said Bede Sheppard, senior children's rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. "Samum may be facing imminent execution simply for the lack of a birth certificate."
Samum was sentenced for killing 'Ammar Ahmad Husain al-Jumaili. A Yemeni child protection organization, Seyaj, contends that records in his court file prove that Samum was under 18 at the time.
Yemen retains the death penalty for a wide variety of offenses, among them murder of a Muslim, arson or explosion, endangering transport and communications, apostasy, robbery, prostitution, adultery, and homosexuality, in addition to various crimes against state security. In 1994 Yemen amended its criminal code to require non-capital sentences for crimes committed by people under 18, including a maximum penalty of ten years in prison for those who commit offenses that would carry the death penalty if they were adults.
However, Yemen lacks adequate mechanisms for determining ages of defendants who lack birth certificates, including adequate forensic facilities with staff trained to determine a defendant's age. According to the United Nations Childrens' Fund (UNICEF), only 22 percent of births in Yemen are officially registered, highlighting the importance of having other reasonable procedures for allowing defendants to establish their ages.
"When governments fail to guarantee universal birth registration, the only fair approach is to give great deference to any available evidence suggesting that the defendant was under age," Sheppard said.
Since 1993, Yemen is known to have executed only one juvenile offender, ‘Adil Muhammad Saif al-Ma'amari, in February 2007. A court in Rawna sentenced al-Ma'amari to death on October 19, 2002, for the murder of a relative in an argument when he was 16. Al-Ma'amari told the court that he was under 18 at the time of the murder. Although the judge ordered a medical examination that resulted in an October 10, 2001 finding that he was under age 17, the court nevertheless imposed a death sentence. Al-Ma'amari had no legal assistance during the trial. The Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights - international treaties to which Yemen is a party - ban the execution of offenders who committed a crime when under age 18. Only three countries - Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Sudan - are known to have executed an individual since the beginning of 2009 for a crime committed before age 18.
Source: Human Rights Watch, January 18, 2011
No comments:
Post a Comment