Sun, Oct 10, 1999 page1

• Human rights activists slam Taiwan over death penalty

  JUSTICE The Ministry of Justice is drawing criticism from death penalty opponents after Chen Chin-hsing and seven other inmates were executed on Wednesday

  • By Irene Lin / STAFF REPORTER
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  A spate of executions on Wednesday, in which notorious criminal Chen Chin-hsing (陳進興) and seven others were shot dead, has prompted heated debate here on the death penalty.

  According to Amnesty International, which has long campaigned for the abolition of the death penalty, the 105 countries which have ended capital punishment by legislation or abstention from practice, now surpass in number the 90 that still use it.

  Among those 90 countries, just a few account for most of the world's executions: China, the Congo, the US and Iran. Taiwan, where more than one hundred death row inmates have been executed in the last five years, is perceived as no less harsh in its implementation of capital punishment.

  

  Police at the Taipei Detention Center in Tucheng burn "ghost money" Wednesday, after Chen Chin-hsing, Taiwan's most notorious killer, was executed.

  PHOTO: CHUNG KUO-WEI, LIBERTY TIMES

  "There is no question Taiwan ranks on the list of countries which account for the majority of the world's executions. But is it something we should be proud of?" asked Peter Ng (黃文雄) of the Taiwan Association for Human Rights.

  "The reality is Taiwan will be seen as barbaric as long as it retains this inhuman punishment," he said.

  The death penalty is used in Taiwan for a range of offenses and is mandatory for 65 different offenses. Human rights activists believe the number of executions has increased in recent years following a public outcry over several kidnap and murder cases between 1996 and 1997. Former Taoyuan County Commissioner Liu Pang-you (劉邦友) and seven others were assassinated at his home in November 1996; the DPP women's affairs department chief Peng Wan-ru (彭婉如) was killed in December, 1996; and Pai Hsiao-yen (白曉燕), the daughter of a TV celebrity, was kidnapped and murdered in April 1997.

  Thirty-two people were executed in 1998, 38 in 1997, and 22 in 1996. The executions Wednesday marked a record for Taiwan's justice system, with eight people executed in a single day.

  Lee Ching-chuan (李清泉), an associate professor of criminology at National Central Police University, with over thirty years of service in the island's correctional institutions, is convinced of the rationale that the increasing use of the death penalty can stop social order from worsening.

  "Combating crime is like treating illnesses. The more serious the illness, the stronger the prescription to be used. The death penalty, which we see as the most severe punishment, is well used to treat those people for whom no prescription works," Lee said.

  Few politicians, meanwhile, dare defy the public's preference for social order, and perception of what contributes to that, over considerations of human rights The Ministry of Justice conducted a study on the merits of capital punishment and assessed public support for it in 1994. The study showed at that time more than 70 percent of respondents supported the death penalty.

  Public outrage over crimes such as those committed by Chen Chin-hsing has discouraged politicians from supporting the abolition of the death penalty. In cases such as Chen's, it would be even more difficult for politicians to address the issue of human rights.

  "Elections are everything, which is true politically, economically and socially. Politicians could speak of human rights when they think voters want them to. But talk of humanism disappears when the general public demands social order over protection of human rights," said Lin Shan-tien (林山田), a criminal law professor at National Taiwan University.

  The trend internationally has been to abolish the death penalty and institute rehabilitation programs. Abolition of the death penalty has been called for in three international treaties, optional protocols to the European and American conventions on human rights, and to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In April this year, the annual meeting of the United Nation Commission on Human Rights in Geneva passed a resolution calling for restriction or eventual abolition of the death penalty.

  In Taiwan, campaigning for abolition of the death penalty did not catch public attention until June 1996, when a campaign was staged by local residents and international human rights organizations to save three death row inmates, known as the Hsichih Trio, Liu Bin-lang (劉秉郎), Su Chien-ho (蘇建和), and Chuang Lin-hsun (莊林勳).

  Charged in a 1991 double murder, the three men received mandatory death sentences and have been awaiting execution. It is alleged that the confessions used as the convicting evidence in their cases were extracted by torture, casting doubt over the legal process in their convictions.

  The Hsichih Trio case has become central to the island's anti-capital punishment campaign because of compelling evidence that the island's criminal justice system is deeply flawed.

  Because of this evidence, Minister of Justice Yeh Chin-feng (葉金鳳) has yet to sign an execution order for the three men. But she did sign the execution orders for the eight inmates last week, despite their having been convicted under the disputed Act for the Control and Punishment of Banditry (懲治盜匪條例), often called the "bandit law."

  Peter Ng believes that Wednesday's executions marked a dark chapter in the history of Taiwan's justice, and warned that capital punishment was fundamentally flawed regardless of the controversies surrounding the law.

  "How can we be convinced a miscarriage of justice didn't occur in one of the eight cases? Capital punishment is dangerous because it's impossible to rectify mistakes once an execution is carried out," said Ng. "How the hell could these people be executed when the Banditry Law is still in question?"

  For your information

  Road to execution

  1. Final conviction by Supreme Court 2. Review by the proxecutor's office for the Supreme Court of possibility of special appeal or retrial 3. Review by the Ministry of Justice 4. Execution warrant signed by Minister of Justice 5. Execution carried out by prosecutor's office for the High Court within 72 hours
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