|
|
World News Archive from 2000
- Archive of World News
See all CADP World News links and excerpts from the years 2001 | 2002.
- About Broken Links
- China Sells Inmates' Organs
HONG KONG -- A Chinese hospital is selling liver transplants from executed prisoners, a Hong Kong newspaper reported Sunday, fueling allegations that China profits from its frequent use of the death penalty. Sun Yat-sen University of Medical Sciences No. 1 Hospital is charging $38,500 per transplant, the South China Morning Post said. It said more than 40 patients from mainland China, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Thailand have received transplants. Beijing consistently denies selling organs, and says they are transplanted from executed prisoners only if they or their families consent. (1/9/00, USA Today)
- Europe: Bush is 'Champion Executioner'
LONDON -- George W. Bush has been a jet fighter pilot, a business owner, and chief executive of a state bigger than most European countries. But across Europe, the president-elect is known primarily for something else: "He's the world champion executioner," said former French Justice Minister Robert Badinter. "He is a horrible symbol of your mania for the death penalty." "What we know about the new president," echoed Claudia Roth, a member of the German Parliament, "is just two things. He is the son of President Bush, and he has sent 150 people to their death in Texas, including the mentally ill." (12/18/00, The Washington Post)
- Europeans Deplore Executions in the U.S.
PARIS -- Many Europeans find it a contradiction that the United States claims to be a leader in protecting human rights when it executed more than 75 people last year. Since the 1976 Supreme Court ruling that allowed the reinstitution of executions, 38 states have adopted a death penalty. To many French citizens, deploring the rise in executions in the United States is no different from taking a stand against Serbian attacks on Kosovo or the Russian bombardment of Chechnya. All European Union countries either ban the death penalty or long ago placed a moratorium on its use. ... "For us, what the Americans are doing is completely incomprehensible, that such an advanced country can be involved in such an act of barbarism," said Henry Leclerc, the president of the Human Rights League in Paris, "No European country does this. No advanced country does this. America is doing it along with countries like China and Russia and other countries that have terrible human rights records. To us, it looks the same as if the Americans were endorsing torture or slavery." (2/26/00, New York Times)
- France: French Parliament Leader Blasts U.S. over Death Penalty, mentions Abu-Jamal
PARIS (Reuters) -- The speaker of France's National Assembly on Saturday slammed the death penalty in the United States and said one-time Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal should not be executed. "There is a stain on America's prestigious image. It's no longer slavery, it's no longer organized racial segregation, it's the death penalty," parliamentary speaker Raymond Forni told a human-rights conference. (6/10/00, CNN)
- Italy: Death Row Inmates Featured in Ads
By Elizabeth Greenspan, Associated Press Writer
ROME (AP) -- Fashion giant Benetton is joining Italy's offensive against the death penalty with its latest advertising campaign -- piercing portraits of American death-row inmates. The posters, which will hit billboards worldwide at the end of January, feature death-row inmates in prison uniforms staring into the camera over the words, "Sentenced to Death.'' The prisoner's name, date of birth, crime and expected method of execution follows.
Italy: Italians Protest Death Penalty
An ancient killing ground became a symbol of mercy Sunday, as Rome's Colosseum was bathed in golden light as part of a year 2000 campaign against the death penalty. ... Pope John Paul II gave the project his blessing Sunday morning, renewing his long-standing appeal for an end to capital punishment. (12/12/99, Associated Press)
- Saudi Arabia: Sudanese, 2 Indians Beheaded
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) -- A Sudanese man and two Indians were beheaded in Saudi Arabia on Friday for various crimes ... The executions, carried out with a sword in a public square, bring the number of people beheaded in the kingdom this year to 24. At least 99 people were executed last year. Saudi Arabia's interpretation of Islamic law mandates the death penalty for convictions of murder, rape, drug trafficking, sodomy or armed robbery. Human rights organizations complain that the accused are denied access to lawyers and do not receive fair trials. (4/28/00, CNN)
- U.N. Urged for Global Ban on Death Penalty
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) -- A Rome-based peace group will present petitions bearing more than 3 million signatures to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan Monday appealing for an end to use of the death penalty around the world. The signatories hail from 146 countries ... Among them are the Dalai Lama, Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid, the Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey, Italian writer Umberto Eco, Italian film director Roberto Benigni, Nobel literature prize winner Dario Fo and World Methodist Council President Frances Alguire. (12/15/00, CNN.com)
News | National News | News Commentary
|
|
|
|
|