Attached is the latest Death Penalty report for July – August thanks to group member for compiling it.
Group’s annual BBQ
We hope to hold our annual BBQ again next Saturday 14th August starting at 4pm weather permitting. Members and supporters welcome. Please let one of us know either by direct contact, a message on this site, or on our Facebook page if you are thinking of coming.
Juvenile hanged in Iran
Sajad Sanjari, 26, was hanged at dawn on Monday with his family only informed afterwards and told to collect his body
The Iranian authorities have secretly executed a young man who was a child at the time of his arrest and had spent nearly a decade on death row, Amnesty International has learned. Sajad Sanjari, 26, was hanged in Dizelabad prison in Kermanshah province at dawn on Monday (2 August), but his family were not told until a prison official asked them to collect his body later that day.
In August 2010, Sanjari, then 15, was arrested over the fatal stabbing of a man he said had tried to rape him, claiming he had acted in self-defence. At his trial, the court rejected Sanjari’s self-defence claim after several witnesses attested to the deceased’s good character. He was convicted and sentenced to death in January 2012.
The conviction and death sentence were initially rejected by Iran’s Supreme Court in December 2012, due to various flaws in the investigation process, but were eventually upheld in February 2014.
In June 2015, Sanjari was granted a retrial after new juvenile sentencing guidelines were introduced which granted judges discretion to replace the death penalty with an alternative punishment if they determined that a child offender had not understood the nature of the crime or its consequences, or if there were doubts about their “mental growth and maturity”. However, a criminal court in Kermanshah province re-resentenced Sanjari to death on 21 November that year after concluding, without explanation, that he had attained “maturity” at the time of the crime.
The court did not refer Sanjari to the Legal Medicine Organisation of Iran – a state forensic institute – for an assessment, and dismissed an opinion of an official court advisor with expertise in child psychology that Sanjari had not attained maturity at the time of the crime. During his first trial, the court had found that Sanjari had reached “maturity” at 15 on the basis of his “pubic hair development”.
Sanajri’s death sentence was subsequently upheld by the Supreme Court and a later request for a retrial was denied. In January 2017, the Iranian authorities halted Sanjari’s scheduled execution, following an international outcry.
Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Middle East Deputy Director, said:
“With the secret execution of Sajad Sanjari, the Iranian authorities have yet again demonstrated the utter cruelty of their juvenile justice system.
“The use of the death penalty against people who were under 18 at the time of the crime is absolutely prohibited under international law, and constitutes a cruel assault on child rights.
“The fact that Sajad Sanjari was executed in secret, denying him and his family even the chance to say goodbye, consolidates an alarming pattern of the Iranian authorities carrying out executions in secret or at short notice to minimise the chances of public and private interventions to save people’s lives.
“We urge the Iranian authorities to put an end to these abhorrent violations of the right to life and children’s rights by amending the penal code to ban the use of the death penalty against anyone who was under 18 at the time of the crime.”
Two others arrested as children at risk of execution
Two other young men – Hossein Shahbazi and Arman Abdolali – sentenced to death for crimes that took place when they were 17 are currently at imminent risk of execution. Their trials were marred by serious violations, including the use of torture-tainted “confessions”. Shahbazi’s execution was scheduled for 25 July 2021 but postponed at the last minute following an international outcry. His execution could be rescheduled at any moment.
Amnesty has identified more than 80 individuals across Iran who are currently on death row for crimes that took place when they were children. In 2020, Amnesty recorded the executions of at least three people convicted for crimes that took place when they were under 18, making Iran the only country in the world to carry out such executions. Since January 2005, Amnesty has recorded the executions of at least 95 individuals who were under 18 years of age at the time of the crimes of which they had been convicted. The real numbers of those at risk and executed are likely to be higher.
According to Iranian law, in cases of murder and certain other capital crimes, boys aged above 15 lunar years and girls aged above nine lunar years may be held as culpable as adults and can, therefore, be punished with the death penalty. As a state party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Iran is legally obliged to treat anyone under the age of 18 as a child and ensure that they are never subjected to the death penalty or life imprisonment.
Source: Amnesty International
Coalition formed to counter review of the Human Rights Act
A coalition of over a hundred organisations has been brought together to try and counter the threat to the Human Rights Act and proposed changes to the process of judicial review. The Conservative government has introduced a range of bills to try and curb or limit protest, human rights and judicial review of their actions. The coalition has been put together by the Humanists.
The unprecedented coalition of over 220 organisations has spoken out against the UK Government’s new plans to reduce the scope of judicial review. They have together formed a coalition [the link provides a list of supporters] to defend human rights and judicial review from Government attack. The coalition, established by Humanists UK, is believed to be the largest human rights coalition in UK history. Those joining include charities, trades unions, human rights bodies including Amnesty, and religion or belief groups. On 21 July 2021 the Government published a new Bill that will curtail judicial review, if it becomes law.
The coalition reflects widespread concern that the various moves made by the current government are taken together, a threat to our freedoms. The Conservatives have long disliked the HRA, characterising it as ‘Labour’s HRA’ when in fact it was cross-party. We await the review itself but there is little doubt it will recommend changes that will weaken it.
Sources: Each Other, Humanists, Amnesty, Politics.co.uk
Huge spy leak uncovered
Israeli company involved in supplying spyware to some of the world’s worst regimes
July 2021
The Israeli company NSO has been involved in selling spyware to a variety of regimes including Hungary, India, Mexico, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and UAE. The Spyware, called Pegasus, enables the governments and their agents to penetrate mobile phones and listen to messages, download call lists and turn the device into a microphone. Amnesty International has been a key player in uncovering the scandal.
The technology is used to intercept all manner of individuals who are critical of the regime or who are engaged in uncovering corruption. Lawyers, human rights defenders, opposition leaders and journalists are all able to be targeted by the technology. The victims will be unaware that their phones and all their personal details and contacts have been penetrated. The Israeli firm claims it ‘does not operates the systems that it sells to vetted government customers’. NSO has said the claims are false.
The evidence of Amnesty’s Security Lab is extensive and on many of the phones it has forensically examined, it found evidence of Pegasus activity. Even the editor of the Financial Times was found on a list of phone numbers leaked to Forbidden Stories who are leading the investigation.
There is extensive coverage in the Guardian in the UK and in other newspapers around the world. Clearly the story has not ended yet and there will be more revelations to come. There will also be reactions when the extent of penetration, the use the information has been put to to stifle debate and silence opposition is uncovered. Whether the Israeli government is more involved than it claims remains to be seen.
Followers of this blog will be familiar with this activity and the technology used to penetrate phones and iPhones. We published a blog concerning a firm near Salisbury which makes and sells equipment similar to NSO, concerning the firm Gamma TSE at Porton. There is no suggestion they are associated with the NSO organisation.
Made in UK: bombed in Yemen
CAAT Webinar focusing on the role of UK arms firms in causing misery and death in Yemen
The purpose of the webinar was to focus on the role of UK arms suppliers in the continuing war in Yemen. It featured a speaker from the Campaign Against the Arms Trade CAAT; one from Forensic Architecture and thirdly, Emily Thornberry MP.
The UK is not the only, or even the largest, supplier of weapons to the theatre, that role was taken by USA. We must also not forget the role of the Iranian government who are supporting the Houthi rebels in the conflict. Half of the Saudi air force is supplied by the UK and that includes spares and maintenance as well to keep them airworthy. US sales have been temporarily suspended by President Biden.
The Saudi government could not continue without UK support they suggested, not just in supplying weapons but diplomatic support as well in the UN. We reported in 2015 the amazing news that Saudi had a seat on the UN’s Human Right’s Council. It seems beyond belief that a country which executes people by decapitation with a sword, often in public, denies basic rights to women and uses torture as a matter of course, should have such a seat let alone be supported by the UK government.
The webinar put the role of arms suppliers in the spotlight who refuse to take responsibility for the mayhem their weapons cause. Thousands have died and schools, hospitals, weddings and funerals have all been the subject of Saudi air raids. RAF personnel are in Saudi to advise the Saudis yet many of these raids are in breach of International human rights. There have been 55 airstrikes on health facilities alone.
Hope for the future
The constant tide of grim stories which emerge from Yemen and the failure of our courts to hold the government to account, might make one despair at change ever being achieved. The UK depends on the arms industry – and the network of City banks and agents who facilitate the movement of money – for a significant chunk of its exports. They have been able to continue with this gruesome business because getting news and footage from the country is extremely difficult. If the carnage was a regular feature of the news on TV things might have changed. As it is, it can carry on largely unseen.
This might change with the arrival of an organisation called Forensic Architecture. They are able to use forensic techniques to form linkages between airstrikes and the companies supplying the weapons. They can show the impact of arms exports and the continuing targeting of civilians. They can link therefore the sale of a jet to the bombing of a hospital. Up to now, the companies, supported by the UK government, have been able to claim these violations are isolated incidents following the Court of Appeal decision to ban such sales. Liz Truss claimed a review had been undertaken enabling sales to continue. Evidence gained by these methods will show complicity and make it harder to argue against complicity in what are war crimes. This might be a game changer.
Forensic evidence might be a game changer
Emily Thornberry MP
Emily Thornberry is the shadow Secretary of International Trade opposite the minister, Liz Truss MP. She said there have been 5 years of deceit practised on the British people. The so called ‘isolated incidents’ based on the curious logic that as they were at different times and in different places therefore they are isolated. British staff in Saudi ‘were in a different room’ therefore not complicit the minister claimed. She pointed to the changing statements about the use of cluster munitions. Her main point was that the UK has come to rely on these sales and it has distorted our policy in the region. The government is caught in a web of complicity from which it cannot easily escape. They will never change their position unless forced to do so by the Courts (which on previous experience is unlikely) or public opinion.
Companies, civil servants and ministers are subject to the International Criminal Court for war crimes. Will a case against those who were complicit in these crimes or who turned a blind eye, find themselves in front of the ICC?
A CAAT report on the arms trade was published today (14th July)
See also Mwatana and the Yemen Data Project and Human Rights Watch
Genocide in China
Parliamentary committee produces damning report
Report by the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee accuses China of genocide towards the Uyghurs in Xinjiang province. The report is entitled: Never Again: the UK’s Responsibility to Act on Atrocities in Xinxiang and Beyond. It does not pull its punches. It is perhaps one of several events which are leading to a reappraisal of our relations with China. The previous Conservative administration was keen to see an improvement in our relations and with it, increases in trade and development. The treatment of the Uyghurs, the repression in Hong Kong, threats to the integrity of Taiwan and the poor behaviour in the early months of the Covid pandemic, is slowly forcing countries to think again.
The crimes being committed against the Uyghurs and other ethnic groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) are truly horrifying. The Chinese government is responsible for the mass detention of more than a million Uyghurs, for forcing them into industrial-scale forced labour programmes, and for attempting to wipe out Uyghur and Islamic culture in the region through forced sterilisation of women, destruction of cultural sites, and separation of children from families. It is altogether a gruesome picture and shocking behaviour from on the UN’s Security Council members.
The Committee heard that under the guise of counter-terrorism, the Chinese government is committing mass atrocities and human rights abuses against the Uyghurs and other ethnic groups in Xinjiang. Reports include the use of forced labour programmes, arbitrary detention in internment camps, cultural erasure, systematic rape, forced sterilisations, separation of children from their families, and a high-technology surveillance system – all endorsed by the Chinese government’s central leadership. Thousands of mosques have been demolished.
One element of the report relates to cotton. It is estimated that some 570,000 people are forced to work picking cotton 84% of which comes from Xinjiang. Satellite imagery shows the use of surveillance equipment, factories surrounded by barbed wire and watch towers. The report notes that ‘virtually the entire’ UK textile and clothing is linked to the abuses.
Virtually the entire UK textile and clothing industry is linked to the abuses in Xinjiang
The UK government has adopted a low profile in this matter although there are signs of a stiffening of attitudes. The Committee argues that guidance is insufficient and that ‘stricter methods’ are needed.
The problem for the public, many of whom are horrified by the stories emerging from Xinjiang, is that action is difficult. How does one know, when buying a cotton T shirt or blouse, whether it has Chinese cotton in it produced by Uyghur slaves? We have to rely on firms applying due diligence in their supply chains. Undoubtedly, some retailers will take this seriously – not just as a matter of morals but because of the risk of reputational damage – whereas others may not do so. A representative of the Ethical Trade Initiative (ETI) thought that voluntary action would not be enough for some retailers. We rely therefore on government to take the lead.
The government is financially supporting the Australian Strategic Policy Institute ASPI, which produces analysis of Chinese actions. A report on the Uyghurs is available here.
To see in more detail what the Ethical Trade Initiative says about the Chinese situation follow this link.
Death penalty report: July
We are pleased to attach our latest monthly death penalty report with thanks to group member Lesley for preparing it. Note that it does not contain any details from China which is the world’s largest executioner of its citizens because details are a state secret. However, a report of the Chinese execution practices was printed in the Sun newspaper in the UK (warning – contains disturbing images).
Corporate due diligence
Call for corporations to ensure due diligence carried out in supply chains
The main thrust of human rights activity since the war and the creation of the UN Declaration has been at governments and trying to improve their behaviour. Campaigns have been waged to stop the use of torture, arbitrary detention, unfair trials and ‘disappearing’ people the regime does not like.
There is now however, an increasing awareness that corporations are key players and, via their supply chains, can have enormous effects on the environment and on the human rights of millions of people in their supply chains. A parliamentary briefing by the Corporate Justice Commission says:
This parliamentary briefing argues that we urgently need a new law to hold companies to account when they fail to prevent human rights abuses and environmental harms. This law should mandate companies to undertake human rights and environmental due diligence’ across their supply chains.
A Failure to Prevent law is vital to ensure the pursuit of a global green transition and a just recovery from the COVID-19 crisis. It would help the UK to deliver its “Global Britain” vision, retain its leadership on business and human rights, and ensure a level playing field for UK business.
Our proposed law would bring the UK in line with its international commitments on human rights and the environment and build on a 2017 recommendation for such a law from the UK’s Joint Committee on Human Rights. It mirrors existing provisions in the UK Bribery Act and matches developments across several states and the European Union.
Corporate Justice Coalition, October 2020
Amnesty and other groups including the TUC and Friends of the Earth have joined in this call.
Much of this activity is hidden from us. We simply see the end product in our shops without always realising that it may have been produced by forced labour, or even slave labour. Recently, it was alleged that the Chinese were using Uyghur slaves to produce cotton. There is also environmental destruction to extract minerals or timber.
There should perhaps be a greater shift in attention towards the activities of these corporate giants who operate almost outside any law.
Amnesty in Salisbury & South Wiltshire 