South Korea did not execute anyone since 1997 but is yet to completely abolish the death penalty
A scene from the South Korean film “Executioner.” South Korea has not executed anyone since 1997 but yet to completely abolish the death penalty. (Photo: Hankyoreh)
Church officials in South Korea have joined other religious and civic groups to urge the government to enact a set of laws to abolish death penalty, which is pending in the parliament.
The religious and civic groups at a joint press conference demanded the government to make South Korea “a completely abolitionist country,” the Catholic Peace Broadcasting Corporation (CPBC) reported on Jan. 2.
The press conference on Dec. 28 marked the 25th anniversary of the last execution of 23 convicts on Dec. 30, 1997, after which South Korea declared a moratorium on executions.
“A total of nine proposed laws were pending with the Legislation and Judiciary Committee of the National Assembly,” the group said in a press release.
The Special Bill on the Abolition of the Death Penalty was tabled at the National Assembly on Oct. 7, 2021, for the ninth time since it was first proposed on Dec. 7, 1999. Only some 30 of the 300 parliamentarians supported the bill.
Father Hyundai Il, chairman of the Social Correctional Pastoral Commission of the Seoul Archdiocese attended the conference along with the representatives of the Catholic Human Rights Commission.
Democratic Party lawmakers Lee Sang-min and Justice Party lawmakers Kang Eun-mee, members of the Human Rights Center of the National Council of Churches in Korea, the Buddhist Human Rights Commission, and Amnesty International Korea, attended the conference.
The group also expressed their hope that the pending case on the unconstitutionality of the death penalty in the country’s top court turn in their favour and would result in a repeal of death penalty.
“It is a known fact that heinous crimes cannot be curbed with the death penalty,” the press statement said.
“The state has a responsibility to stop the vicious cycle of violence,” it added.
The European Union had earlier delivered an official letter to the Constitutional Court in support of the abolition of the death penalty, it recalled.
In two earlier hearings, the top court had ruled in favor of the death penalty in 1996 and 2010, with judges voting 7-2 and 5-4 respectively. For the death penalty to be termed unconstitutional 6 out of 9 votes must be in favor of abolishing the practice.
Nobel Peace Prize laureate President Kim Dae-jung enacted a moratorium on executions in 1998 that existed until 2012.
According to the New York-based rights group Parliamentarians for Global Action (PGA), South Korea sentenced one person to death in 2018 and 61 individuals remain on death row.
South Korea ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1990 but has yet to ratify the Second Optional Protocol aiming at the abolition of the death penalty, PGA noted.
The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea, Amnesty International, the World Committee Against the Death Penalty, and representatives of seven religious’ groups in Korea had filed an appeal in the top court to halt the death penalty.
The group also expressed their hope that South Korea would be able to “lead the abolition of the death penalty in Asia” by abolishing the practice in its territory.
South Korea legally allows the death penalty though it has maintained an abolitionist policy for over two decades.
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