01 November 2006

A tiny step forward, but nowhere near enough

China has taken a tiny step to broaden human rights as it enacted legislation that requires the country's highest court to approve death penalties before they are carried out.

Legal experts estimate that the Supreme People's Court reviews will cut the number of executions by 30% by bringing some consistency to the system. Poorly trained provincial judges have often been quick to apply the death penalty with limited understanding of the law or legal process.

Executions are the last step in a legal system in which lawyers are attacked and disbarred for mounting vigorous defenses, where torture violations have been amply documented, where any legal decision is subject to political review and where there is little tradition of open debate. Even the number of executions China carries out annually is a state secret.

China put to death at least 1,770 people in 2005, according to Amnesty International, which calculated the figure based on Chinese media reports. But many experts believe that the actual number might be as high as 10,000 a year. Even limiting the scope to known executions, China carried out more than 80% of the 2,148 executions worldwide last year.

The government has also been embarrassed by a series of wrongful death penalty cases, including that of a man executed for killing his wife, who showed up a few years later. That led to a government "kill fewer, kill carefully" campaign.

It does not herald a major reform of the legal system, however. In fact, China's Supreme People's Court had review authority until the early 1980s, when calls for speedy justice decentralized the authority. And relative to other human rights issues pressed by overseas critics, this change had significant support within the Chinese legal establishment. Other problems in China's legal system remain. There are no juries, police have enormous latitude, and forensics or other independent experts are rarely used. For decades, whether a suspect lived or died often depended on timing, location and the political winds. Neighboring provinces sometimes handed down dramatically different sentences for the same crime, and those caught for relatively minor offenses during "strike hard" anti-crime campaigns have been far more likely to face execution.

Amnesty International welcomed the new legislation but urged the authorities to abolish the death penalty once and for all. "This new legislation will possibly help improve the quality of trials for those facing the death penalty in China - and may also reduce the number of executions," said Purna Sen, Asia-Pacific Programme Director. "But there is a danger that it could also further entrench the death penalty system in China, unless it is accompanied by other measures, including full transparency on the use of the death penalty nationwide and a reduction in the number of crimes punishable by death."

Amnesty International has been urging China to accelerate reforms aimed at abolishing the death penalty. "We hope this is a step towards full abolition of the death penalty," said Purna Sen. "It is only by abolishing the death penalty that China can guarantee that the innocent will not be put to death."

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