Posted by Martina on Nov 23rd, 2007
Here I am on the other side of the planet seeking perspective, so I pick up a copy of the The Monthly: Australian Politics, Society & Culture. It’s like MacLeans, but better. Think MacLeans with a bit of Harper’s intellectual sensibilities thrown in and you have The Monthly.
The issue I read has eight pages devoted to a story about the Bali Nine. The Bali Nine are 9 young Aussies in their 20s who were sentenced to death in a Bali court on drug charges. Indonesian police arrested them in April 2005 when they attempted to smuggle 8kg of heroin into Australia. Drug smuggling is a serious crime to be sure, one whose maximum penalty is death in Indonesia. Six of the 9 men were sentenced to death.
This story is interesting for two reasons: 1. the only reason the Indonesians captured them was because the Australian Federal Police Force tipped them off. 2. Australia signed the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights over fifteen years ago.
In signing this Covenant, Australians agreed “that all measures of abolition of the death penalty should be considered as progress in the enjoyment of the right to life,” and that the country would work to abolish the death penalty around the globe. Canada also signed this document, hence both countries’ policy of seeking clemency for any of their citizens convicted of capital crimes in the United States and elsewhere. Until this month that is, when the Harper government decided to shift gears and said it would not seek clemency in the case of Robert Allen Smith, an Alberta man convicted of murder in a Montana court in 1982.
Earlier this month, the six Australians lost their appeal in an Indonesian court. Unless something changes, they will soon find themselves on an Indonesian beach at sunrise in front of a firing squad, wearing white aprons with red targets painted over their hearts.
The Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, has been under fire for his inconsistent behaviour regarding capital punishment. His government is accused of outsourcing capital punishment by facilitating the arrest of its citizens in countries such as Indonesia. There is no reason that the AFP couldn’t have waited until the Bali Nine landed in Oz to arrest them, but they chose to let the Indonesians do it. This is no different than the American policy of rendition—the outsourcing of torture to places like Syria.
Continued:
http://creativeintersections.netfirms.com/nfblog/?p=74
Howard, Harper & Capital Punishment
