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February 28, 2006

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China executes about 8,000 people a year, or 22 a day and yet they don't have too many candlelight vigils going on. The judiciary is trying to better regulate executions and bring the system out into the open:

China, which executes more people than any other country, is to hold open hearings for a large number of death penalty appeals in an effort to better regulate executions, a legal scholar said Monday. From the second half of 2006, all death penalty appeals which go to a provincial high court will be heard publicly, a departure from the usual practice of closed reviews and investigations, said Liu Renwen, a scholar at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences...

With the judicial system under scrutiny after a series of widely publicized wrongful convictions, the Supreme Court has also moved to reclaim its right to a final review of death sentences, but Liu said the policy was meeting resistance from lower courts. "When the Supreme Court can take this power back is still a question," Liu told foreign correspondents. "Local governments think it is a good tool to control public security. If they lose such power they think, of course, it would not be good."

This latter part refers to the announcement last October that the Supreme People's Court is struggling to re-assert control over capital punishment in response to widespread outrage at arbitrary sentencing. What is missing from the debate is the pros and cons of capital punishment. The article notes:
Some 68 crimes in China can incur the death penalty, about half of which are non-violent offences, Liu said.

 posted by Simon on 02.28.06 at 09:13 AM in the China law category.




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Death Penalty in China
Excerpt:
Weblog: Treehouse Cityguide
Tracked: February 28, 2006 10:24 PM

Genickschuss für die Armen, Giftspritze für die Reichen - Über die Todesstrafe in China
Excerpt: Bei den Themen aus China, die auch in Deutschland immer wieder diskutiert werden, ist die Todesstrafe ein Dauerbrenner. Zur Einführung ein Ausschnitt aus dem “Länderkurzbericht China, Hongkong und Macau” von amnesty international ...
Weblog: B.L.O.G. - Bissige Liberale ohne Gnade
Tracked: March 17, 2006 04:48 AM


Comments:

I always think it is quite menaingless to quote the number in absolute values for china
....GDP, #capital punishment, #mobile phone, etc. China is going to top others due to its sheer pop size.

what matters most when one compares China with other countries in the world is 'per capita' measure.
i do not doubt china still ranks among the top group in this case, given that there are 68 crimes that could lead to death penalty. but i would say the "more than any other countries" is pretty meaningless.

what concerns me most is that many innocents were executed (and these are not politically related), because of the incomptence and corruption locally. and this is actually related to your question of whether 'capital punishment' should be abolished. (such cases also happens in even the US, though at a much lower frequency)

p.s. one of the 68 crimes include corruption with bribes over a certain amount of money (1M RMB or so).

 posted by: sun bin on 02.28.06 at 10:35 AM [permalink]

Every day you have 22 families to explain that what matters is "per capita" rate. Enjoy.

Best.

Enzo

 posted by: Enzo on 03.01.06 at 12:46 AM [permalink]

Great point, Enzo. But let's use per capita rates. The USA has about 1/4 the population of China. They don't execute 6 people a day in the US.

 posted by: Simon on 03.01.06 at 08:07 AM [permalink]

of course they don't.
even if you compare it with texas or australia, the rate is higher in china.

but that makes it comparable and helps to set more realistic target for china.
if we are comparing china with iraq, nork or say, italy. we really do not know what those numbers mean.

 posted by: sun bin on 03.03.06 at 03:20 PM [permalink]




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