Pakistan lifted a seven-year moratorium on the death penalty in December 2014, in the wake of the tragic terrorist attacks on the Army Public School in Peshawar. Executions were restored under the pretence that they would only apply to individuals convicted of terrorism related offences. Of course, within a few months, Pakistan lifted the moratorium on all death-eligible crimes.
Terrorism and murder certainly fall under the category of death-eligible crimes; however, nonviolent offences such as adultery, kidnapping, highway robbery, and drug-related offences are also punishable by death. If you’re a member of the Pakistani Army and you show “cowardice” in the presence of any enemy, you could be executed for that offence.
Furthermore, combined with the lack of due process in the Pakistani criminal justice system, many have been wrongfully executed. Pakistan has sentenced juveniles and mentally ill individuals to death despite domestic legislation and international treaties forbidding their execution.
Last year, the Supreme Court acquitted two brothers of murder charges, but it later turned out they had already been executed. Apparently, even dogs are unable to escape the death penalty in Pakistan.
Next month, Pakistan will be reviewed by the United Nations Human Rights Committee, the monitoring body for the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). Pakistan is likely to face backlash from the Committee over its use of the death penalty — it will be déjà vu for a country that received a scathing Convention Against Torture review over the same issue earlier this year.
Pursuant to the ICCPR, Pakistan is required to reserve the death penalty for only the most serious crimes — intentional crimes with lethal or other extremely grave consequences. The Human Rights Committee has stated that imposing the death penalty “for offences which cannot be characterized as the most serious, including apostasy, committing a third homosexual act, illicit sex, embezzlement by officials, and theft by force, is incompatible with article 6 of the Covenant.” Therefore, by executing those convicted of lesser offences, Pakistan’s use of the death penalty is in direct violation of the ICCPR.
For this reason, Pakistan’s cruel and unjust death penalty laws continue to face intense scrutiny from the human rights community. The United Nations, the European Union, and many local and international human rights groups around the world have demanded that Pakistan re-impose its moratorium on the death penalty. Despite the calls from these groups, the death penalty still attracts broad support among the Pakistani public. Many cite Islamic or Sharia law as the reason for their support. However, some of the 27 crimes that can receive the death penalty in Pakistan have no support in the Quran or authentic Hadiths; thus, even Sharia law is not a justification for such punishments.
Supporters of the death penalty often use the retributive justice argument to justify executing criminals, i.e. criminals deserve to be executed because we should “take an eye for an eye.” We can set aside the fact that this argument fails for many of the crimes that are eligible to receive the death penalty — no one is arguing that the Pakistani Penal Code should state that the proper punishment is to kidnap a kidnapper or rape a rapist.
Due to the lack of due process in the Pakistani criminal justice system, many have been wrongfully executed. The country has sentenced juveniles and mentally ill individuals to death despite domestic legislation and international treaties forbidding their execution
Despite the inconsistency, this argument is still widely used to justify the executions of murderers. Even then, the retributive justice argument falls apart. If we were really “taking an eye for an eye,” the death sentence would only apply to murderers who arbitrarily chose a victim, told the victim he would murder them at a specified date, confined them in a prison, tortured them mentally and/or physically for eleven years, and then finally murdered them.
No man can inflict such pain; only the state.
If Pakistan is not swayed by the moral argument against capital punishment, it must at least ensure that it is complying with its international commitments. Hundreds of people have been executed in our country as Pakistan has risen in the ranking of countries deemed to be the most prolific executioners in the world. Since lifting the moratorium, Pakistan has abused its power by executing individuals for crimes that breach the holdings of the Human Rights Committee, thereby violating the ICCPR.
The EU has already warned Pakistan that a failure to comply with international conventions could lead to the suspension of Pakistan’s GSP+ status — a preferential tariff system that grants Pakistani products a duty-free access to the European market. As the Human Rights Committee reviews Pakistan’s application of the ICCPR provisions in July, all eyes should be on Pakistan’s violation of its moral and legal responsibilities. Pakistan must bring an end to the misuse of the death penalty and the series of wrongful executions in our country by bringing back the moratorium on the death penalty.
The writer is a J.D. student at Yale Law School and a summer intern at Justice Project Pakistan, a human rights law firm in Lahore
Published in Daily Times, June 25th, 2017.