Malaysia abolishes death penalty amid global push

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Malaysia has decided to abolish the death penalty, with a bill due to be put to parliament next week, meaning a reprieve for some 1,200 inmates currently on death row, ministers said Thursday.

Communications and multimedia minister Gobind Singh Deo Gobind said Malaysians' opposition to capital punishment is what prompted the government's decision.

An amendment to the law is to be tabled in parliament on Monday, government minister Liew Vui Keong was quoted as saying by the daily The Star.

Liew also called for the executions of people already on death row to be put on hold immediately. "Since we are abolishing the sentence, all executions should not be carried out," he said.

Prison personnel escort three Mexican brothers, sentenced to death for drug trafficking, as they leave the appeals court in Putrajaya, Malaysia, August 14, 2013. /VCG Photo

Currently, crimes such as murder, kidnapping, and drug trafficking carry a mandatory death sentence in Malaysia. This is usually carried out by hanging.

Between 2007 and 2017, 35 people were hanged in the country, according to the daily New Straits Times.

A total of 1,267 prisoners are meanwhile on death row, making up 2.7 percent of the 60,000-strong prison population.

Malaysian rights advocates welcomed the government's decision on Thursday, arguing there was never any proof that mandatory death sentences deterred offenders from violent or drug-related crimes.

"The death penalty is barbarous, and unimaginably cruel," N. Surendran, an adviser with the Lawyers for Liberty rights group, said in a statement.

UN call to end death penalty

Malaysia's decision came a day after UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres made a renewed call for ending capital punishment worldwide.

Protesters join a "procession" against plans to reimpose the death penalty in Manila, Philippines, February 18, 2017. /VCG Photo

In a statement to mark World Day Against the Death Penalty, Guterres deplored that many of those executed were "often impoverished, women or hailing from minority groups" who were executed "without legal representation or transparent criminal proceedings."

One more US state

On Thursday, the US state of Washington also moved to ban the death penalty, becoming the 20th US state to do so.

The state's supreme court ruled that it was "imposed in an arbitrary and racially biased manner."

As such, the death penalty "fails to serve any legitimate penological goal," the court said.

The ruling was partly based on a study that showed that African-Americans were 4.5 times more likely than whites to be sentenced to death in the state.

Activists protest the death penalty in front of the US Supreme Court in Washington, DC, June 29, 2016. /VCG Photo

Washington has not carried out any executions since 2010, but will now convert all death sentences to life terms in prison.

A total of 30 US states still impose the death penalty, mostly for murder, but 12 of them have not executed anyone for 10 years or more, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

From a high of 98 in 1999, the number of people executed in the US has dropped to 18 so far this year. This has been accompanied by a drop in the number of people being sentenced to death.

(With input from wire agencies)

(Top picture: Buttons being sold by anti-death penalty activists outside the Supreme Court in Washington, DC, June 29, 2012. /VCG Photo)