China has won gold again in its most successful event, executing people.

In a report released by Amnesty International, it is claimed that China has executed a minimum of 470 people. The reason why this figure is only a minimum is because the death penalty in China is a state secret and they refuse to actually inform the international community of the actual figure.

Even though the estimated number of executions commited by China is at 470, it is believed that China executes around 10,000 people a year as this was the case in 2006. I doubt that the final number has varied too much. 1

Along with China, Iran had a minimum of 317, Saudia Arabia had a minimum of 317, Pakistan had a minimum of 135 and the US executed 42. These five countries contribute to 88 percent of all executions. Egypt and North Korea have executed people too, but the figure is not known.

Some of the executions of 2007 according to Amnesty International include

• Ja'Far Kiani, father of two, was stoned to death for adultery in Iran in July.
• A 75 year-old North Korean factory manager was shot by firing squad in October for failing to declare his family background, investing his own money in the factory, appointing his children as its managers and making international phone calls.
• Mustafa Ibrahim, an Egyptian national, was beheaded in Saudi Arabia in November for the practice of sorcery.
• Michael Richard was executed in Texas, USA, on 25 September after a state courthouse refused to stay open an extra 15 minutes to allow the filing of an appeal based on the constitutionality of lethal injections. Richard's attorneys had been unable to file the appeal on time because of computer problems; problems they had already brought to the court's attention. The US Supreme Court then refused to stop the execution. Earlier in the day, however, it had agreed in a Kentucky case to review the lethal injection issue, a decision that led to a de facto moratorium on all other lethal injection executions around the country. The Supreme Court's ruling is expected later this year.

And Iran, Saudia Arabia and Yemen stsill execute people under the age of 18. 1

The death penalty in all cases is wrong. You are beyond a hypocrite to justify the death penalty for some people and not others. You either believe in the death penalty or not. I firmly believe in the right to life which is a fundamental right in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which China is a signatory to.

China needs to clean it's act up. I think I've said that so many times recently my head is starting to spin. China wanted the Olympic games to show the world that it could clean it's act up on human rights, and they have done the complete opposite. Sure, the worlds media is focused right on them now because of the Olympic games, but if China thought they were going to have the Olympics without any public pressure, they were completely wrong.

- Beju -