Global trend to abolish death penalty

EDITORIAL : Global trend to abolish death penalty

Regional economic integration is a global trend, as is building 12-inch fabs in China and breastfeeding. These are all topics that government officials and businesspeople have recently rushed to support.

In one area, Taiwan was not just following a global trend; it was a trendsetter, at least in Asia: Since the end of 2005, Taiwan has had a de facto moratorium on legally sanctioned execution and the Taiwanese government - both the current administration and its predecessor - announced its long-term goal to be the abolition of capital punishment. To that end, the number of crimes punishable by death was reduced and mandatory death sentences ended. The Ministry of Justice had been preparing to abolish the death penalty next year.
Recent developments, however, appear to indicate some unwanted backsliding on the issue. 

After former minister of justice Wang Ching-feng (王清峰) said she would not sign any execution orders, legislators and others demanded with great indignation that "the law be enforced." Wang's resignation has since been followed by her successor, Tseng Yung-fu (曾勇夫), publicly declaring his willingness to sign such orders once all legal avenues have been exhausted.

The timing of Amnesty International's latest report on capital punishment, Death Sentences and Executions 2009, released on Tuesday, therefore could not have been more timely. Indeed, Amnesty thought it important enough to send Roseann Rife, the deputy program director of its Asia-Pacific office, to Taipei on Tuesday to publicize the release of the report and call on President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to abolish the death penalty.

Amnesty's report makes for somber reading. While Taiwan did not execute anyone last year, the report notes that it did sentence seven people to death - putting it almost halfway down the list of countries that handed out death penalties, alongside Ghana, Syria and Zimbabwe but behind Singapore and Bukina Faso, which each sentenced at least six. Other Asian nations had even more: Japan (34), Vietnam (at least 59) and Malaysia (68). 

Of course seven is a far cry from list-topper Iraq's 366 death sentences - or the US' 105 - and there are 10 countries, led by China, that won't even provide figures on how many prisoners they execute. However, Burundi and Togo both abolished the death penalty last year, bringing the number of countries without capital punishment to 95. Unfortunately, Asia as a whole once again led the world in the number of people executed.

After Wang's resignation, the Executive Yuan said the goal of abolition could not be met without public consensus and suggested the ministry needed to do more to educate the public about the global trend toward abolition. Tseng has asked the officials to conduct a biannual survey of public opinion on the death penalty. Opinion polls, however, do little to educate.

While the paternalistic approach of the Ma government, especially its relentless quest for greater ties with China in the face of widespread public opposition, is often decried, it would be admirable if it could muster the same level of commitment to its own stated policy of abolishing capital punishment.

Eliminating the death penalty is just as important as making Taiwan into a regional financial/transhipment/aquaculture or orchid-exporting hub. The 44 people now on death row should not be sacrificed out of political expediency or a lynch mob mentality, or because the justice ministry and legislature have yet to finish amending the law or reforming the judicial system.

Abolition is a global trend. Taiwan can and should be leading the way in Asia by putting an end to capital punishment.