MONDAY, MARCH 11, 2002
China plans lethal injection for executions
AFP
BEIJING: China plans to increasingly use lethal injections as a "civilized" means of executing criminals, in a move which has received a "favourable response" even from those on death row, state media reported.
The use of injections was "a civilized way of law enforcement", Liu Jiachen, vice president of China's Supreme People's Court, said in an interview with the state Xinhua news agency released late Sunday.
"We began to introduce such a way of execution after successful experiments on animals," he said.
Currently China -- which is estimated to put many more people to death than the rest of the world combined -- despatches condemned criminals with a bullet to the back of the neck.
Some courts have already begun using lethal injection, but its more widespread use has been hampered in part by a lack of proper facilities, Liu said.
"Execution by lethal injection is a full expression of the civilized way of law enforcement we have always pursued," he said, according to Xinhua.
Liu added: "It has proved that lethal injection has received favourable response from both condemned criminals and their relatives and from all quarters of the society."
The exact number of people put to death in China each year is a closely-guarded secret, but rights group Amnesty International has said more people were executed in the country during an anti-crime crackdown which began last April than in the rest of the world combined over the past three years.
The New York-based Human Rights Watch said recently that between April and October last year, at least 1,800 executions were recorded in Chinese press reports, while twice that number were sentenced to death.
Copyright © 2002 Times Internet Limited. All rights reserved.