Maldives Goverment will enforce death penalty, declares President Yameen

President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom has declared that the Progressive Party of Maldives-led (PPM) coalition government will implement the death penalty despite international pressure.

Speaking at a campaign event for PPM MP Ahmed Mahloof in Male’ last night, President Yameen said his administration’s decision to enforce the death penalty was a “historic day” in the Maldives’ democracy.

“Enforcing the death penalty is not something I will do because I want to. This is a very difficult thing. This is not an easy thing to do for any president or [public] servant. But our society cannot bear the loss of a life as well as the opportunity for further loss of life as a result of not respecting [the value of a human life],” he said.

“For that reason, no matter how much I don’t want to do it or how difficult it is, I have to do this on behalf of the rights of the people as they have placed that trust in me.”

President Yameen revealed that the government had formulated regulations implementing capital punishment on Thursday, based on the advice of the cabinet.

The government decided to enforce the regulations to ensure the safety and security of the community, he said, adding that the public wished to see action taken to stop the “slaughter of innocent citizens.”

Moreover, a majority of the Maldivian people were in favour of introducing the death penalty despite opposition from international partners, Yameen contended.

He stressed that a convict would only be put to death in accordance with Islamic Shariah following due process through the courts.

At the final stage, he explained, the Supreme Court would decide whether capital punishment was warranted as qisas (retaliation).

Under the new regulations specifying procedures for enforcing the death penalty, President Yameen said that both the victim’s and the convict’s family would be consulted after the Supreme Court decision to see whether the former demanded the death penalty and not blood money as retaliation.

Following an order issued by Home Minister Umar Naseer in January to the Maldives Correctional Services for implementation of the death penalty through lethal injection, Amnesty International called upon the government to halt any plans to end the current moratorium on the death penalty.

The international human rights organisation described the possible reintroduction of capital punishment as a “retrograde step and a serious setback for human rights in the country”.

Meanwhile, President Yameen – on a state visit to Sri Lanka at the time of Naseer’s announcement – subsequently promised “broad discussions” on the issue in his cabinet.

Death sentences have traditionally been commuted to life sentences by presidential decree since the execution of Hakim Didi in 1954 for the crime of practising black magic.

The Maldives currently has 20 prisoners sentenced to death by the Criminal Court.

Source: Minivan News, March 14, 2014

Maldives government to enact death sentence with lethal injection

COLOMBO, Feb. 10 (Xinhua) -- The Maldives government has approved the death penalty and will soon enact regulations on the process of execution, local media reported here on Monday.

Presidential spokesperson Ibrahim Muaz Ali was quoted as saying the government has observed increasing murders in the Maldives and agreed the execution of death penalty is possible in accordance with existing laws.

After discussions, the Maldives Cabinet decided to draft detailed regulations on how actions will be taken in investigations and prosecutions with regards to the death penalty, Muaz said.

The regulations will grant all the constitutional rights to the suspect, and include the matters the prosecutor general must confirm before the prosecution begins, local media outlet Haveeru reported.

The ministers also decided to include in the regulations how to act in communicating with the relatives of the deceased and that a sentence shall be made on such a case based on the decision of the Supreme Court.

The cabinet also advised the president on creating means to determine if everything has been completed lawfully in the procedures leading to the implementation of death penalty. The president was also advised that death by lethal injection was the best option and that this must be included in the regulations.

Home minister Umar Naseer has issued an order on Correctional Services to make preparations to implement death sentences, requiring the use of lethal injection for execution.

The order requires the use of lethal injection for execution, and the penalty be carried out at Maafushi prison.

The latest death sentence was handed to Hussain Humam, the prime suspect in the murder of former Ungoofaru Member of Parliament Dr. Afrasheem Ali.

Afrasheem was found stabbed to death on the stairway of his apartment building on the night of Oct. 1, 2012.

Humam had denied the murder charges despite confessing to the crime in a previous hearing. But the court referred to his previous confession and found him guilty of the murder charges last Thursday.

Twenty people have been sentenced to death so far. The High Court overturned the sentence of one of the convicts, whilst the rest have been stalled at the appeal court.

Source: Xinhua, Feb. 11, 2014

Maldives UN team calls for abolition of death penalty, flogging

The UN country team in the Maldives has issued a statement calling for the abolition of both corporal punishment and the death penalty in the Maldives.

While the Maldives still issues death sentences, these have traditionally been commuted to life sentences by presidential decree since the execution of Hakim Didi in 1956, for the crime of practicing black magic.

Recent calls for presidential clemency to be blocked led former attorney general Azima Shukoor to draft a bill favouring the implementation of the penalty via lethal injection. It was met with opposition by several religious groups such as the NGO Jamiyyathul Salaf, which called for the draft to be amended in favour of beheadings or firing squads.

More recently, the state has called for a High Court verdict on whether the practice of presidential clemency can be annulled.

The Maldives continues to issue and implement flogging sentences for certain crimes, notably extra-marital sex. The vast majority of those sentenced are women.

An earlier call by UN High Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay in 2011 calling for a moratorium on flogging as a punishment for extramarital sex led to protesters gathering outside the UN building, carrying placards with angry slogans including “Islam is not a toy”, “Ban UN” and “Flog Pillay”.

Earlier this year, widespread global publicity of such a sentence handed to a 15 year-old rape victim led to two million people signing an Avaaz petition calling for an end to the practice of flogging in the Maldives.

In its statement, the UN team in the Maldives called for the Maldives to ensure its legislation and practices fulfilled the international human rights obligations to which it was signatory.

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Source: Minivan News, May 22, 2013

Maldives must commute death sentences for two juvenile offenders convicted of murder

The Maldives authorities must commute the death sentences and stop the potential execution of two teenagers who yesterday received capital punishment for a murder allegedly committed when they were under 18, Amnesty International said.

The two juveniles were convicted by the Juvenile Court in the capital Male' over a fatal gang stabbing incident in February. Both the accused, who have now reached 18, reportedly deny the charge.

"The Maldives authorities are flouting international law - anyone convicted of a crime committed when they were under 18 is exempt from the death penalty," said Polly Truscott, Amnesty International’s Deputy Asia-Pacific Director.

Maldives is a State Party to two UN treaties, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which forbid capital punishment for crimes committed by persons below 18 years of age.

"The authorities must immediately reverse these death sentences, and the prosecution must not try to uphold the death sentences in any appeals," said Polly Truscott.

“The sentences of all other prisoners on death row should be commuted, and an official moratorium on executions established, towards abolishing the death penalty.

“The Maldives is entering new and dangerous territory – imposing death sentences for crimes allegedly committed by children is alarming.”

The victim's family had reportedly earlier asked the court for the death penalty. The two teenagers have 90 days to appeal the death sentence at the High Court.

Another teenager was apparently acquitted due to a lack of evidence while murder charges were filed against several others in connection with the attack.

“Amnesty International opposes the death penalty in all cases without exception. There is no convincing evidence that the death penalty works as a special deterrent against crime,” said Truscott.

Source: Amnesty International, May 3, 2013

Maldives: AG says "no debate over not implementing death penalty"

Attorney General (AG) Aishath Azima Shakoor has said last night that implementing capital punishment cannot be debated over.

“It cannot be debated to not implement capital punishment. Debating over whether a certain verdict is not correct or that the death penalty is not a suitable punishment for a crime because it wasn’t a murder in the first degree but a murder in the second degree is different. But it cannot be debated that the death penalty cannot be implemented for murder,” she said during an interview on TVM’s “Raajje Miadhu” show.

She revealed on the show that the AG’s office is working on drafting the procedures required to implement the death penalty and that the Home Minister Mohamed Jameel Ahmed has also sent a letter to the parliament to identify the procedures required to implement the death penalty.

When asked by the presenter that given several people claiming problems with the judicial system if whether it was the right juncture to implement the death penalty Azima criticized such claims saying that a certain group is conspiring to weaken the legal system.

Azima noted that there will always be opposition in the international community against the death penalty with those who believe the punishment is inhumane but there are also those who believe that in case of an increase in extreme crimes “extreme punishment” needs to implemented.

“The other argument is that if someone commits a crime that necessitates capital punishment then it must be implemented….even America with the most developed legal system implements the death penalty. So if a person commits a crime that deserves the death penalty like killing with intent or planning and murdering a lot of people, isn’t that inhumane?” she questioned.

Azima said that the government will be pressured by those who are against capital punishment and statements will be made as well. She also said that the Penal Code currently in parliament process would need to be perfect and that there are several degrees of the death penalty.

She said that if the death penalty is to be implemented all the courts should support it as it is the procedure followed by all countries implementing the death penalty. She added that legal specifications should exist on the implementation of the death penalty.

“For example, what are the rights of the person who should be executed? What are his the last rights he’s entitled to? What should be done for his family? What are the rights of the victim’s family? This needs to be specified. There already are people on whom the death penalty has been issued, but so far never implemented. Societal sensitivities are also involved in this, but I don’t this is the time to be talking of it. But there is also the question if a lower court issues the death penalty on a person whether it should be implemented? Several people tell me that this problem will be solved when it is implemented. Then I ask how it should be done. They don’t have an answer for that,” she said.

She revealed that considering the messages on the media and SMS she receives from people it is widely believed that implementing the death penalty will solve the problem, but that she found it hard to confirm. Yet she also said that considering the matter in one way she believes that it may reduce the number of murders in the Maldives.

“For example Singapore, the death penalty is implemented on drug traffickers caught smuggling drugs into the country. People don’t and cannot smuggle drugs into Singapore easily. The Maldives doesn’t have such a comparison. There are several such comparisons in the world,” she said.

Source: haveeruOnline, July 24, 2012

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Death penalty can be implemented within existing justice system: Maldives Chief Justice

July 4, 2012: The death penalty can be executed within the existing justice system of the Maldives, Chief Justice Ahmed Faiz has said.

Following the moment of silence observed outside the High Court on Wednesday afternoon in honor of the lawyer Ahmed Najeeb, who was found brutally stabbed to death this week, the Chief Justice told reporters that Maldives legal system is based on Islamic Sharia which allows the death penalty to be implemented.

Due to increasing criminal related deaths in the country, mainly due to the gang violence that expanded into an alarming level in the country, the public sentiment for implementing capital punishment is growing stronger.

Following Najeeb’s murder – the sixth homicide recorded this year alone – Home Minister Mohamed Jameel Ahmed and Attorney General Aishath Azima Shakoor, as well as and other prominent lawyers and lawmakers, have publicly endorsed their support for implementing capital punishment to deter increasing crime rates.

According to Chief Justice Faiz, each and every ruling of the court must be enforced for the country to see the effectiveness of the judiciary.

More than 10 people have been sentenced to death in the past decade, out of which none have been executed by the authorities tasked with the role, he observed.

For the past 60 years, the state has been commuting these death sentences to life imprisonment (25 years).

“The Maldives judicial system is constructed in a manner whereby another body is responsible to enforce the punishment once it is decided by the court,” Faiz explained.

“Not only in murder cases, but if all court verdicts on all crimes are properly enforced, we will see the [positive] outcomes of these verdicts,” the Supreme court judge noted.

A motion related to death penalty is currently being reviewed by the parliament which, if passed, will make the enforcement of the death penalty mandatory in the event it is upheld by the Supreme Court, halting the current practice of the President commuting such sentences to life imprisonment.

Source: minivannews.com, July 4, 2012

Maldives: Parliament accepts amendment to Clemency Act to uphold death sentences

Parliament today accepted the amendment presented by Jumhoree Party (JP) MP Ibrahim Muthalib which requires the death sentence be implemented as execution if the Supreme Court upholds a death sentence issued by a lower court or if the Supreme Court itself issues a death sentence.

Out of the 59 present MPs there were 14 MPs who declined the amendment and 3 MPs that did not vote on either side.

MDP MPs Alhan Fahmy, Eva Abdulla, Hamid Abdul Gafoor, ‘Reeco’ Moosa Manik, Ilyas Labeeb, Imthiyaz Fahmy, Ibrahim Rasheed, Rugiyya Mohamed, Mohamed ‘Colonel’ Nasheed, Ahmed Rasheed, Mohamed Aslam, Ibrahim Mohamed Solih and DRP MPs Ali Azim and Hussein Mohamed voted to dismiss the amendment.

Meanwhile MDP MPs Ahmed Easa, Ahmed Hamza and Independent MP Mohamed Nasheed were the 3 that did not vote on either side.

If the amendment is passed the president will not have the authority to grant clemency on those sentenced to death and law enforcing agencies will be left with no other choice but to execute those sentenced to death.

Statistics from the Criminal Court show that over the past 10 years, it has sentenced 14 persons to death which have not implemented. Police later arrested them for committing other offenses.

Before Muthalib presented this amendment, Maldivian Democratic Party MP Ibrahim Rasheed who also voted to dismiss the bill today presented the same bill weeks ago and withdrew it in the last minutes.

Rasheed said he will present the bill after some belated bills in the parliament were passed.

When presenting the amendment Muthalib said the objective of the amendment was to uphold Islamic Sharia in the Maldives.

Meanwhile, the Criminal Justice Procedure Bill presented by MDP Parliamentary Group leader Moosa Manik was approved by the parliament recently and has been sent to the National Security Committee to review.

The Maldivian judicial system defers to Islamic Shar’ia law in cases where existing laws and regulation are found not to apply. In an interview with Minivan News in 2008, Minister for Islamic Affairs Dr Abdul Majeed Abdul Bari claimed that three crimes punishable by death under Islamic Shar’ia were murder, adultery (by those already married) and apostasy.

Critics of the amendment have pointed to the state of the judiciary as a reason for delaying the bill, with one judge last week acknowledging that 31 serving judges had criminal records. The judiciary has also been criticised by the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), which questioned the independence of the Judicial Services Commission (JSC).

The last person be judicially executed in the Maldives was Hakim Didi in 1953, who was executed by firing squad after being found guilty of consipiracy to murder using black magic.

Source: Minivan News, April 19, 2011

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Islamic Foundation calls for death sentence if apostate fails to repent

The Islamic Foundation has called for self-declared apostate Mohamed Nazim to be stripped of his citizenship and sentenced to death if he does not repent and return to Islam.

Nazim claimed he was "Maldivian and not a Muslim" during a public question-and-answer session with Islamic speaker Dr Zakir Naik, the first time a Maldivian has publicly announced he is not a Muslim.

According to the Maldivian constitution all citizens are required to be Muslim, and the country is always described as a "100 %" Muslim country.

The 37 year-old angered many in the approximately 11,000-strong crowd with his statement during Dr Naik's 'Misconceptions about Islam' lecture on Friday.

Dr Naik responded that Nazim had read the wrong books and "deviated from Islam", and requested him "to read correct books on Islam, and Inshallah, you'll come back to Islam."

However Nazim did not relinquish the microphone and pressed Naik to clarify the penalty for apostasy.

"In Islam, there are many cases, it doesn't mean death penalty," Dr Naik explained. "But if the person who reverts who was a Muslim then converts to and becomes a non-Muslim and propagates his faith and speaks against Islam, and if it's Islamic rule, then the person should be put to death. But just because a person who is a Muslim becomes a non-Muslim, death penalty is not the ruling."

Nazim was escorted from the venue by police for his own protection, after members of the audience attempted to attack him.

Police Sub-Inspector Ahmed Shiyam said 2 men who tried to attack Nazim were arrested after they attacked the police officers protecting him. Nazim himself "was not injured because police protected him," Shiyam said.

He was taken to a police building where a crowd of protesters had gathered, calling for him to be punished. Shiyam confirmed that Nazim is now being held in an undisclosed location for 5 days while police investigate "in consultation with the Islamic Ministry and the Prosecutor General's office."

Today the Islamic Foundation of the Maldives issued a press statement calling on judges to give Nazim the opportunity to repent "and if he does not, then sentence him to death as Islamic law and Maldivian law agree."

"The Islamic Foundation believes that the person who announces apostasy should be punished according to Islamic laws," the NGO said, warning that Nazim represented "a disturbance to the religious views and the religious bonds that exist with Maldivians."

"Hereby if this man does not do his penance and come back to the Islamic religion, the Islamic Foundation of the Maldives calls to take the citizenship away from this man as mentioned in the Maldivian constitution."

If case crossed into areas not covered by the laws of the country, "then the judges should rely on Islamic law," the NGO stated, as per article 142 of constitution which says judiciary shall look into Islamic shar'ia on matters not covered in law, and sentence accordingly.

"So it is requested that the commissioner of police run the legal research on this man and take this to the Prosecutor General's office. We also request the Prosecutor General to go through this matter and to take this man to the criminal court for trial," the Islamic Foundation said.

A government official involved in the legal process, who requested that his name and department be kept anonymous, said he was "really worried" and described the case as "a very sensitive subject".

"Police are investigating the case," he said. "My understanding is that the court authorities will give [Nazim] opportunities to change his mind. I think he will be given every opportunity to think about his decision."

Minister for Islamic Affairs Dr Abdul Majeed Abdul Bari told Minivan News that Ministry officials had acted quickly to remove Nazim from the venue "for his own protection", and had now handed the matter over to the legal system.

"I don’t know if there is a penalty for apostasy according to Maldivian law," he said.

The Adhaalath Party issued a press statement claiming that the act violated the constitution of the Maldives and called on the government "to strengthen Islam and protect the constitution."

Religious NGO Jamiyyathul Salaf declined to comment on the matter during a press conference held today on another matter, however NGO Jamiyyathul Musliheen expressed "concern and regret" over the incident.

"Not a few number of Maldivian youths are moving further from the religion, and many of them are going renegade," the NGO said in a press statement, adding that "it is a responsibility of the government to strengthen Islam in the country."

President of the Human Rights Commission to the Maldives (HRCM), Ahmed Saleem, said "what happened was really unfortunate."

"I think the best thing will be to talk to him and to make him understand the situation and the repercussions, talks which HRCM will welcome," Saleem said.

He said he was unsure how the Maldivian government would handle the incident.

"I'm afraid of the reaction from the international community should we resort to harsh action," he said. "I don't think it would be in our interest – we have just been given a seat on the UN Human Rights Council. This is something we need to think seriously about before we start using harsh language."

Minivan News contacted several local human rights NGOs however they had not responded at time of press.

A senior government source, who requested anonymity, said he felt the case "will be a real test of how the government will abide by its international commitments."

Press Secretary for the President Mohamed Zuhair was on medical leave and unable to comment.

Minivan News was unable to reach Nazim himself for comment, however a person close to the matter described him as "a very sensible guy who will think of the people around him. But he will not give up on calling for people to be more honest about themselves. I think he will become a genuine refugee if he refuses to take back his words," she said.

Source: Minivan News, May 30, 2010