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SINGAPORE: Indian national facing execution in Singapore

June 20, 2003

 

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ASIAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION - URGENT APPEALS PROGRAM

20 June 2003
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UA-24-2003: SINGAPORE: Indian national facing execution in Singapore

SINGAPORE: Death penalty passed on Arunprakash Vaithilngam, Indian national
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SITUATION:

In December 2001, Arunprakash Vaithilingam, a migrant worker from Tamil Nadu in India, stabbed his roommate, also an Indian national, to death with a knife during a drunken argument. He was arrested and charged with murder. He is facing execution after he was convicted of death in February 2003.

At his trial, Arunprakash Vaithilingam stated that he didn't intend to kill his roommate and he didn't even realize he had stabbed him. He and his several friends who had witnessed the argument testified that they rushed the wounded man to hospital immediately but he died shortly afterwards. Despite eyewitness evidence, the Singapore High Court found Arunprakash Vaithilingam guilty of murder, an offence which carries a mandatory death sentence.

Arunprakash Vaithilingam's relatives have petitioned the president of Singapore for granting clemency. According to the Amnesty International, the president of Singapore will review the petition for clemency by the beginning of August. The Indian newspaper said that the Indian government has also intervened on his behalf, requesting the Singapore authorities to commute his death sentence to life imprisonment.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION:

Singapore is believed to have one of the highest per capita rates of executions in the world. Government figures show that out of 340 people executed between 1991 and 2000, 89 were executed for murder. Between 1996 and 2000, over half those executed for murder were foreign nationals. Families of convicts are only informed of the impending execution before one week. There is virtually no public debate about the use of the death penalty in the country.

Human rights organizations and Amnesty International oppose the death penalty in all cases as a violation of the right to life and the right not to be subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, as proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Also, studies showed that it was more likely to be imposed on those who are poorer, less educated and more vulnerable than average. It needs to combat violent crime however, there is no persuasive evidence that that the death penalty deters crime more effectively than other punishments.


RECOMMENDED ACTION:

Write letters before 01 August to the Singapore authorities expressing your concern about Arunprakash Vaithilngam who is facing the execution and urge the authorities to stop implementing the death penalty that violates the people's rights to life. Sample letter and contact details for your action are provided below.

SUGGESTED LETTER:

His Excellency S R Nathan
The President
Office of the President
Istana Annexe
Singapore 238823
Fax: + 65 6738 4673

Date

Your Excellency

Re: SINGAPORE: Indian national facing execution in Singapore

Mr. President, I urge you to act decisively to commute death sentence passed on Indian national Arunprakash Vaithilngam to life imprisonment.

The death penalty is a violation of the right to life, one of the most fundamental human rights. I understand that it needs to combat violent crime. However, the death penalty has never been shown to have a unique deterrent effect and is brutalizing to all involved. If the execution is carried out, it will only cause more suffering for the relatives of Arunprakash Vaithilingam.

Yours sincerely

_______________

SEND LETTERS TO:

1. His Excellency S R Nathan
The President
Office of the President
Istana Annexe
Singapore 238823
Fax: + 65 6738 4673

2. Prof. S . Jayakumar
Minister for Law and Foreign Affairs
Ministry of Law
100 High Street
The Treasury #08-02
Singapore 179434
Fax: + 65 6332 8842

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If you want to know more about Death Penalty in Singapore, please visit;
http://www.thinkcentre.org/article.cfm?ArticleID=301
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Thank you.

Urgent Appeals Programme
Asian Human Rights Commission

Document Type :
Urgent Appeal Case
Document ID :
UA-24-2003
Issues :
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Extended Introduction: Urgent Appeals, theory and practice

A need for dialogue

Many people across Asia are frustrated by the widespread lack of respect for human rights in their countries.  Some may be unhappy about the limitations on the freedom of expression or restrictions on privacy, while some are affected by police brutality and military killings.  Many others are frustrated with the absence of rights on labour issues, the environment, gender and the like. 

Yet the expression of this frustration tends to stay firmly in the private sphere.  People complain among friends and family and within their social circles, but often on a low profile basis. This kind of public discourse is not usually an effective measure of the situation in a country because it is so hard to monitor. 

Though the media may cover the issues in a broad manner they rarely broadcast the private fears and anxieties of the average person.  And along with censorship – a common blight in Asia – there is also often a conscious attempt in the media to reflect a positive or at least sober mood at home, where expressions of domestic malcontent are discouraged as unfashionably unpatriotic. Talking about issues like torture is rarely encouraged in the public realm.

There may also be unwritten, possibly unconscious social taboos that stop the public reflection of private grievances.  Where authoritarian control is tight, sophisticated strategies are put into play by equally sophisticated media practices to keep complaints out of the public space, sometimes very subtly.  In other places an inner consensus is influenced by the privileged section of a society, which can control social expression of those less fortunate.  Moral and ethical qualms can also be an obstacle.

In this way, causes for complaint go unaddressed, un-discussed and unresolved and oppression in its many forms, self perpetuates.  For any action to arise out of private frustration, people need ways to get these issues into the public sphere.

Changing society

In the past bridging this gap was a formidable task; it relied on channels of public expression that required money and were therefore controlled by investors.  Printing presses were expensive, which blocked the gate to expression to anyone without money.  Except in times of revolution the media in Asia has tended to serve the well-off and sideline or misrepresent the poor.

Still, thanks to the IT revolution it is now possible to communicate with large audiences at little cost.  In this situation there is a real avenue for taking issues from private to public, regardless of the class or caste of the individual.

Practical action

The AHRC Urgent Appeals system was created to give a voice to those affected by human rights violations, and by doing so, to create a network of support and open avenues for action.  If X’s freedom of expression is denied, if Y is tortured by someone in power or if Z finds his or her labour rights abused, the incident can be swiftly and effectively broadcast and dealt with. The resulting solidarity can lead to action, resolution and change. And as more people understand their rights and follow suit, as the human rights consciousness grows, change happens faster. The Internet has become one of the human rights community’s most powerful tools.   

At the core of the Urgent Appeals Program is the recording of human rights violations at a grass roots level with objectivity, sympathy and competence. Our information is firstly gathered on the ground, close to the victim of the violation, and is then broadcast by a team of advocates, who can apply decades of experience in the field and a working knowledge of the international human rights arena. The flow of information – due to domestic restrictions – often goes from the source and out to the international community via our program, which then builds a pressure for action that steadily makes its way back to the source through his or her own government.   However these cases in bulk create a narrative – and this is most important aspect of our program. As noted by Sri Lankan human rights lawyer and director of the Asian Human Rights Commission, Basil Fernando:

"The urgent appeal introduces narrative as the driving force for social change. This idea was well expressed in the film Amistad, regarding the issue of slavery. The old man in the film, former president and lawyer, states that to resolve this historical problem it is very essential to know the narrative of the people. It was on this basis that a court case is conducted later. The AHRC establishes the narrative of human rights violations through the urgent appeals. If the narrative is right, the organisation will be doing all right."

Patterns start to emerge as violations are documented across the continent, allowing us to take a more authoritative, systemic response, and to pinpoint the systems within each country that are breaking down. This way we are able to discover and explain why and how violations take place, and how they can most effectively be addressed. On this path, larger audiences have opened up to us and become involved: international NGOs and think tanks, national human rights commissions and United Nations bodies.  The program and its coordinators have become a well-used tool for the international media and for human rights education programs. All this helps pave the way for radical reforms to improve, protect and to promote human rights in the region.