Some Way Yet to Killing Off the Death Penalty (Julio Godoy)

  To convince the United Nations General Assembly to approve a worldwide moratorium on capital punishment

  Julio Godoy -- Inter Press Service

   If it were not for a handful of countries persisting in carrying out executions, activists for the abolition of the death penalty around the world would have departed for home after their Third World Congress which took place in Paris Feb. 1-3, saying: "Mission accomplished."

   The handful of countries still resisting all arguments and evidence -- the United States, the People's Republic of China, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and North Korea -- account for more than 97 percent of all executions carried out annually, some 5,000 or more, according to the 2006 'Death Penalty Worldwide' report by the Italian group ‘Hands off Cain.’

  Another 50 countries are still applying the death penalty, but sporadically. These executed some 156 of their citizens in 2005.

  The trend towards abolition is undeniable, the international congress heard. In 1981, France became the 35th country in the world to abolish capital punishment. Today, 25 years later, 142 countries do not carry out executions any longer; either they have abolished capital punishment entirely or are observing a moratorium.

  The mixed feelings such figures stir up, and the sense of urgency there is to convince the United Nations General Assembly to approve a worldwide moratorium on capital punishment, dominated the three-day congress in Paris, attended by hundreds of personalities and activists from around the world.

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