A divided Philippine Supreme Court suspended tomorrow's executions of two kidnappers until the end of next month, narrowly blocking President Gloria Maca-pagal Arroyo's order of the first use of capital punishment in four years.
Ruling 7-6 yesterday, the justices said they needed more time to consider whether claims of new evidence would warrant a fresh trial for Roberto Lara and Roderick Licayan.
"Pending resolution of this incident," the court said, it was freezing -- for 30 days -- the executions by lethal injection that had been set for 3pm tomorrow.
Arroyo, who is seeking a fresh term in elections on May 10, had said only a stay by the Supreme Court would stop her from pushing through with the first executions since the government of her ousted predecessor, Joseph Estrada, imposed a ban in 2000.
"We're very happy," Benilda Lara told reporters at Bilibid prison south of Manila as she put her arms around her son's two young children. "God has answered our prayers."
Presidential spokesman Ricardo Saludo said Arroyo had halted all preparations for the executions after the court ruling.
"The president maintains she is against the death penalty but has lifted the ban as a sign that her government is serious about battling crime," Saludo told reporters.
Arroyo, who ordered the executions last month after a wave of kidnappings for ransom, had vowed to reimpose the moratorium after Lara and Licayan were put to death.
"It's not easy for me to make this decision because I am a pro-life president, but there are unusual circumstances," Arroyo told reporters last weekend.
Critics have accused Arroyo of swapping the lives of the two convicts for votes, particularly from the tiny but influential ethnic Chinese community that suffers most of the abductions.
Dozens of human rights groups protested outside the Supreme Court building this week, urging the judges to stop the execution and reopen the cases of Lara and Licayan.
The acting director of Bilibid prison, Reinerio Albano, said he felt "relieved" the two convicts had won the brief reprieve.
"It's no joke because it involves human lives," he told reporters, adding Lara and Licayan would be returned to their cells on death row from a pre-execution isolation area.
But not everyone was happy with the suspension.
"The reopening of cases only prolongs the agony of victims," said Dante Jimenez, founder of an anti-crime support group.
"We respect the decision of the Supreme Court. However, let this not be a precedent that all cases of heinous crimes may be reinvestigated."
The executions have become an emotional issue in the run-up to May's election, alienating Arroyo from former political allies including the powerful Roman Catholic church.
"If anything, it only highlighted her opportunism and politics of expediency," Etta Rosales, a member of the House of Representatives, said on Tuesday.
There are more than 1,000 people on death row, including 22 foreigners convicted of drug trafficking.
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