The worst execution and the death penalty in china

The worst execution and the death penalty in china 

verdict Executions are carried out by hanging, shooting in the back of the head or lethal injection. 

In many years there are several times more reported executions in China than the rest of the world combined. 

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Even then according to Amnesty International: "Only a fraction of death sentences and executions carried out in China are publicly reported." 

The annual toll is not released and is treated as a state secret.

These days many executions are carried out with a lethal injection as opposed to gunshots. Executions generally take place in specialized chambers or vans, away from public view.

 In 2009, the city of Beijing began using lethal injections in the execution of condemned prisoners instead of shooting them.

In January 2008, the Chinese government announced it would expand the use of lethal execution and phase out executions by gunshot.

Severe punishments have traditionally been regarded as a warning, summed by the old Chinese saying "killing a chicken to scare the monkeys." 

During the Cultural Revolution executions were often performed in public, and Chinese citizens were often forced to watch as "a form of solidarity with the people against the people's enemies."

On August 30, 1983, 30 convicted criminals were executed in a sports stadium before a cheering crowd of 60,000 people. 

In the 1970s some executions were broadcast on prime time television. Even today there are mass sentencing rallies and public executions.

There have been cases of innocent people being executed. 

Defendants who face the death penalty are often denied their rights. In one case involved a migrant worker who killed four people the ruling on his appeal was done by the same judge who made the initial ruling.

A suspended death sentence is usually commuted to life imprisonment after two years if the person shows good behavior. 

This can later be reduced to 20 years or less with good behavior. In 2007 prisoners that received these “death penalties with reprieves” outnumbered prisoners that were executed.

Studies seem to indicate that the threat of capital punishment does little to deter crime. The official position in China is that someday China will abolish the death penalty but that "conditions aren't right" to do so now.

the world combined. San Francisco-based human-rights group Dui Hua Foundation estimates that 4,000 prisoners were executed in 2011. 

Amnesty International no longer reports execution data from China, but believes the figure is "in the thousands." By comparison, there were 43 executions in the U.S. in 2011, according to Washington nonprofit organization Death Penalty Information Center.

According to Amnesty International of the 2,400 execution performed in 2008, 1,700 were in China. 

Dui Hua estimates that 5,000 executions were carried in China in 2009, down from 7,000 in 2007 and 10,000 a year in the 1990s. 

As many as 6,000 people were put to death in 2010. By comparison, according to Amnesty, the country with the next-highest recorded rate of executions in 2010 was Iran, with 252, followed by North Korea with 60, Yemen with 53 and the United States with 46.

Death penalty numbers are derived from press reports. Many human rights believe the real number of executions is much higher.

 Information on executions is a carefully guarded state secret. Dui Hua’s Joshua Rosenzweig told AFP, “There are a number of problems and uncertainties in the way the death penalty process is carried out.

One of the major problems is that it is a very untransparent system.” In March 2010, Amnesty International slammed the Chinese government for not revealing the true number of people executed each year.

John Kamm, founder of the Dui Hua Foundation wrote Washington Post: “Ten years ago, China was executing more than 10,000 prisoners a year.

 The human rights group I direct estimates the annual rate to be less than 5,000 now, a reduction due in part to President Hu Jintao's effort to develop a "harmonious society" When Hu took office as Communist Party chairman in 2002, the country was executing as many as 12,000 convicted criminals a year.

The annual number of executions could be down to roughly 2,000 by the time Hu leaves office at the end of 2012. 

Opponents of the death penalty will argue, passionately and correctly, that that number is still a human rights violation of the most serious kind. 

But the sharp drop in executions is a positive step toward the government's goal of ensuring that only "the most vile and serious crimes" are punishable by death — and its stated goal of eventually abolishing the death penalty in China. [Source: John Kamm, Washington Post, August 16, 2010]

According to Amnesty International there were 470 executions in China in 2007, the most of any country in the world but way down from previous years. 

Many see the drop as temporary and a result of new rules on judicial reviews and teh fact that China wants to look good