MOJ ignores inconvenient laws
By Lin Hsin-yi 林欣怡 / Fri, Mar 11, 2011 - Page 8 Taipei Times
On Friday last week, Minister of Justice Tseng Yung-fu (曾勇夫) signed off on the executions of five people in one day, for which the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty (TAEDP) protested it violated the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and domestic law.
In response, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said at a public event that “the death penalty does not violate” the ICCPR.
The Ministry of Justice (MOJ) released a press statement saying: “Carrying out the death penalty is, at this stage, in accordance with the law and does not violate the UN covenants.”
It is not surprising that the ministry would respond like this, because this is how it generally responds. Nevertheless, it failed to answer the points that we raised.