Execution in Chechnya
3 SEPTEMBER 1997
"Chechen Republic: Amnesty International condemns public execution."
Amnesty International today condemned the public execution of a
woman by firing squad in the centre of Grozny in line with a death
sentence handed down by the Chechen Supreme Shari'a Court.
"As more and more countries are abolishing the
death penalty, the
Chechen Republic continues to carry out this cruel, inhuman and
outmoded
form of punishment," Amnesty International said today. "What makes
it even
more barbaric was that executions are filmed by the
authorities."
According to reports, the court found two women
guilty of
murder of the husband of one of the women and sentenced the
them to death. The executions went ahead despite calls by Amnesty
International for clemency. The second woman was reportedly not
executed
because the doctors established at the last moment that she was
pregnant.
It has been reported that the Chechen Procurator
General and other
senior law enforcement officials announced today that a number
of
executions of death row prisoners will be carried out in the next
few days.
Although the Chechen Shari'a law reportedly demands that persons
executed
be buried immediately, President Aslan Maskhadov has issued a decree
that
the bodies of those executed should be put on public display and
should
bear placards on their chests with a description of the crime for
which
they were executed.
It was also reported that recently, President
Maskhadov demanded of the
Shari'a courts "severe verdicts" and their "immediate enforcement".
This is a second public execution in Chechnya,
according to Amnesty
International's information, after the execution in April of a
Chechen man,
Ibrahim, from the settlement of Bachi-Yurt.
Amnesty International called on the Chechen
President to immediately
grant clemency to all prisoners currently on death row in the Chechen
Republic. The organization also called for the revision of the
provisions
of the Chechen Criminal Code which provide for the death penalty
and
corporal punishments with a view to abolish the death penalty and
all acts
which constitute of torture and ill-treatment.
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