Human rights group Amnesty International has urged members to push Singapore's government to grant clemency to a 21-year-old Nigerian scheduled to be executed next week for drug trafficking.
Amnesty International issued an "urgent action appeal" on Friday to its members around the world to ask the Singapore government to spare the life of Amara Tochi Iwuchukwu and for a moratorium on all executions in Singapore.
Iwuchukwu is to be executed on Friday at Singapore's Changi Prison after the Southeast Asian country's president rejected his clemency appeal, according to a statement from Nigeria's non-governmental Civil Liberties Organization (CLO).
Iwuchukwu was arrested at Singapore's airport in November 2004 after arriving from Dubai with 100 capsules containing 727g of heroin, estimated by authorities to be worth S$1.5 million (US$970,000).
Singapore has some of the world's harshest drug laws, including a mandatory death penalty for anyone found guilty of trafficking more than 15g of heroin.
At the time of his arrest, Iwuchukwu told narcotics officers the pills were African herbs that he was supposed to give to a sick friend. He also told officers that he came to try out for soccer teams playing in the country's Singapore League.
Amnesty International's appeal suggested that the judge who convicted Iwuchukwu "appears to have accepted that he might not have realized the substance he was carrying was heroin."
The verdict said that a "Mr Smith" gave Tochi the pills to transport, according to Amnesty International.
Reasonable doubt
Amnesty quoted the verdict as saying: "There was no direct evidence that he knew the capsules contained diamorphine [heroin]. There was nothing to suggest that Smith [who gave Tochi the pills to transport] had told him they contained diamorphine, or that [Tochi] had found that out of his own."
Court officials were not available for comment yesterday.
The group asked its members to immediately send letters, e-mails and faxes to Singapore's prime minister, deputy prime minister and attorney general in an effort to stop the execution.
CLO, the Nigerian human rights group, has urged Nigeria's government to intervene.
The Nigerian High Commission in Singapore helped Iwuchukwu file the appeal for presidential clemency and is in regular contact with his family in Nigeria, a consular officer said on Friday on condition of anonymity, citing protocol.
Also convicted and on death row in the same case is Okele Nelson Malachy, 35, a stateless African who Amnesty said is reportedly from South Africa.
Singapore's strict drug laws made international headlines -- and caused an outcry in Australia -- in December 2005 when the city-state executed a 25-year-old Australian heroin trafficker despite numerous appeals from the Canberra government.
Amnesty International says Singapore is believed to have the world's highest per capita execution rate.
The country's leaders say the tough laws and penalties are an effective deterrent against crimes that ruin lives.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese