A THOUSAND PEOPLE FACE THE DEATH PENALTY IN IRAQ; AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL REPORTS

Iraq now has one of the highest rates of execution in the world. At least 1,000 people are believed to be under sentence of death, 150 of whom have exhausted all legal remedies available to them and are therefore at serious risk of being hanged.

Following the US-led invasion in 2003 which overthrew Saddam Hussain, the death penalty was suspended
promptly on 10 June 2003 by the Head of the interim Coalition
Provisional Authority (CPA), within a month of his taking charge. However,
just over a year later, on 8 August 2004, the Iraqi interim government
which replaced the CPA restored the death penalty. Since then, the present
government has widened both its scope and its application.
The use of the death penalty in Iraq lacks transparency. The authorities
publicly justify the use of the death penalty as a response to the
continuing high level of political violence, but they provide very little
information on executions and some have been carried out secretly. For
example, on 10 June 2009 some 19 people, including one woman, were
executed, but this was not officially announced via the media; the
information was leaked. Many of the death sentences were handed down
following court proceedings which did not meet international standards
for fair trials, as international human rights law requires.
Under the rule of Saddam Hussain, prior to March 2003, the Iraqi
authorities used the death penalty on a very large scale. A wide range
of activities could incur the death penalty, including some not
normally considered crimes, such as expressing political dissent and
opposing the policies of Saddam Hussain and his ruling Ba’ath party.
Amnesty International was never able to establish precisely how many
people were sentenced to death and executed each year. The Iraqi
authorities provided no statistics and often did not disclose publicly
when executions were carried out. Those executed included many
members of banned secular parties and religious organizations and
other suspected government opponents, students, journalists,
businessmen, and army deserters. Still others were subjected to
enforced disappearances and were killed out of hand, without any
semblance of legality. REASONS FOR REINSTATEMENT The current Iraqi government was
elected in December 2005 and took office in May 2006. It argues that the death penalty is needed to reduce
the widespread violence in the country, yet such violence has
continued unabated since the death penalty was restored. Armed groups
have continued to carry out bomb attacks killing large numbers of
civilians, including members of ethnic and religious minority groups.
These attacks – many of which have been carried out by suicide bombers
who, by their very nature, are unlikely to be deterred by the prospect of the
death penalty – recently increased in the run-up to and following the 30
June deadline for the pullout of US troops from Iraq’s cities and towns.
Despite this, senior Iraqi government officials continue to publicly justify
and support the use of the death penalty, although the country’s
President, Jalal Talabani, is a notable exception. He has long opposed the
death penalty, but has delegated his power of ratification of death
sentences to his two deputies so that executions continue despite his
stated personal commitment to abolition. Once a death sentence is
upheld by the Court of Cassation, it is referred to the Presidential Council
for ratification and implementation. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamil al-
Maliki has repeatedly defended the use of the death penalty and he has
called for the execution of former senior members of the Ba’ath party
who have been sentenced to death for crimes committed under Saddam
Hussain. On 31 May 2009, for example, he declared that former
officials under Saddam Hussain would be executed if they were found
to have ordered the poison gas attacks on Halabja and other villages
in 1988 which killed thousands of members of the Kurdish minority. In
a speech to relatives of the victims of Halabja, he stated: “I promise you,
we will not keep silent when it comes to applying the death penalty against
all the criminals who are condemned [in this case]”.
Iraq’s Human Rights Minister Dr Wajdan Mikhail Salam was also
reported in the Spanish newspaper El Mundo on 28 May 2009 to say that
“capital punishment is not applied easily [in Iraq], it takes many steps”,
but that the situation “requires the application of the death penalty… I
think at the moment the death penalty is very necessary in Iraq. It is not the
time to abolish it. And you can be sure that it is not easy to sentence
anybody to death.” Previously, she had suggested that the government
might abolish the death penalty, telling the UN Human Rights Council
in March 2007: “we are working at the present moment in order to
pave the way to eliminate capital punishment in Iraq, after restricting
it to the largest possible extent”. Amnesty International is
disappointed that a minister whose portfolio is to advance the cause
of human rights protection should advocate the death penalty, and
urges her and her colleagues instead to prioritize the promotion
and protection of human rights and eradicate executions as a matter
of urgency.
SCOPE OF THE DEATH PENALTY
The Iraqi Penal Code of 1969, which remains in force, prescribes the
death penalty for a wide range of offences. These include
premeditated murder, all crimes compromising the internal security
of the state, attacks on means of transportation resulting in fatalities, attempting to overthrow the
government by violent means, and damaging public property. Since
2003, additional capital crimes have been created under the Anti-Terrorism
law of 2005 and Law 10 of 2005, which established the Statute of the
Supreme Iraqi Criminal Tribunal (SICT) which may impose the death penalty
for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and membership of and
supporting armed groups. The Iraqi Internal Security forces’
Penal Code, enacted in February 2008, and the Iraqi Military Code,
promulgated in April 2007, also prescribe the death penalty for
offences committed by members of the military, police and other security
forces. These include passing on secrets, plans and instructions to
an armed group, passing on state secrets to other countries directly
or indirectly, and deliberately sabotaging and damaging means
of communication, transportation, weapons and explosives. Decree
Number 3 of 2004, issued by the then Iraqi interim government
to reinstate the death penalty, prescribes the death penalty even
for crimes that do not have lethal consequences, such as carrying out
abductions not resulting in death. International human rights treaties
such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR),
ratified by Iraq in 1971, stipulate that the death penalty may only be
imposed for the most serious crimes. Under international law, “most
serious” means that it should be applied as a most exceptional
measure, and should not go beyond intentional crimes, with lethal or other
extremely grave consequences.
THE COURTS AND UNFAIR TRIALS
The vast majority of death sentences have been passed by
the Central Criminal Court of Iraq (CCCI) in Baghdad and in the
governorates. The CCCI was established by the Coalition
Provisional Authority in June 2003 with jurisdiction over crimes
relating to terrorism, sectarian violence, organized crime and
government corruption. Trials before the CCCI consistently fall
short of international standards for fair trials.
Defendants commonly complain that “confessions” were extracted
from them under torture during pretrial interrogation, often when they
were held incommunicado in police stations or in detention facilities
controlled by the Ministry of Interior. These “confessions” are then often
used as evidence against them at their trials, and are accepted by the
courts without taking any or adequate steps to investigate
defendants’ allegations of torture. Defendants also complain that they
are not able to choose their own defence lawyers; those tried before
the CCCI on capital charges have defence lawyers appointed by the
court if they are unable to pay for defence counsel, but the quality of
such representation is low. Some lawyers refuse to represent
defendants accused of “terrorism”, mostly Sunni Muslims, fearing
reprisals by armed militia groups linked to Shi’a political parties
represented in the Iraqi Council of Representatives (parliament).
Trials before the SICT also fall short of international standards for fair
trials. The SICT was set up to try Saddam Hussain and officials from
the former Ba’ath administration accused of war crimes, genocide
and crimes against humanity.
Proceedings before this tribunal
have been marred by political
interference, undermining its
independence and impartiality. It
was reported in September 2008
that the Iraq government had
engineered the dismissal of one
of the judges who had tried Saddam
Hussain shortly before the year-long
trial ended in 2006, replacing the
judge with one considered more
likely to support the imposition of
the death penalty. The tribunal has
also failed to ensure the safety of
defence lawyers, witnesses and
others. A number of lawyers,
judges and prosecutors have been
murdered by armed groups. Since
its establishment the SICT has
sentenced at least 11 people to
death. Four, including Saddam
Hussain, have been executed, while
at least seven are still on death row.
SAFEGUARDS FOR FAIR
TRIALS
International law requires that the
death penalty “can only be carried
out pursuant to a final judgement
rendered by a competent court”
(Article 6.2 of the ICCPR). This
includes respecting the absolute
prohibition of torture and other illtreatment,
which is considered
customary in international law and
applies to all states. As a consequence
of that absolute prohibition, any
statement extracted as a result of
torture or other ill-treatment should
never be used as evidence in any
proceedings against the detainee.
International law requires a number
of other safeguards in order to ensure
the right to fair trial. These include
the right to a public hearing by a
competent, independent and impartial
tribunal; the right to be presumed
innocent until proven guilty, the right
to have access to a lawyer of one’s
own choosing, the right to call
witnesses for the defence and the
highest standards for the gathering
and assessment of evidence.
SECRECY SURROUNDING
RECENT EXECUTIONS
In the face of criticism from the UN, the European Union and international human rights organizations, in recent months the Iraqi authorities have disclosed little information or statistics about executions. In July 2009, at least 1,000 prisoners were believed to be on death row, including about 150 prisoners who had exhausted all means of appeal or clemency. According to the Iraqi Human Rights Ministry’s report for 2008, some 956 prisoners were
under a death sentence at the end
of 2008, 751 of whom were held in
prisons and detention facilities
controlled by the Ministry of Justice,
including 12 women. The other 205
prisoners were held in prisons and
detention facilities controlled by
the Ministry of Interior. At least
seven people sentenced to death
by the SICT are being held by the
US military in Camp Cropper in
Baghdad. Between January and
early November 2008, 365
people were sentenced to death,
according to the Iraqi Supreme
Judicial Council. So far this year
Amnesty International has recorded
at least 60 death sentences issued
by Iraqi courts.