Crime and Punishment
A resolution to improve worldwide human and civil rights.

Category: Human Rights
Strength: Significant
Proposed by: SchutteGod

Forum thread: https://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic...9&t=379480

Description: The World Assembly,

Reasserting its authority to protect basic civil rights, including the rights of the accused and condemned for even the most heinous and monstrous of crimes,

Acknowledging the great division among member states as to the morality of capital punishment,

Respecting the rights of nations who view capital punishment as a violation of their deepest held beliefs, and seeking to preserve the rights of said nations to shield their accused from immoral punishments,

Contending that minimal restrictions should be imposed upon member states to ensure that punishments for serious crimes are carried out humanely,

Defining for purposes of this resolution, "execution," "capital punishment," and "death sentence (or penalty)" as the forfeiture of a person's life, as carried out by a state or an agent of the state, as a formal punishment for a crime, and

Specifying for purposes of this resolution, that "nonviolent crime" does not include any offense related to treason, espionage, mutiny, or criminal negligence causing physical death or injury;

Hereby:

1. Declares that member nations may employ capital punishment as a sentence for the gravest and most serious of offenses, provided that such sentences do not violate any relevant point of international law within this or any previous General Assembly resolution still in effect;

2. Forbids member nations from issuing criminal sentences disproportionate to the crime committed;

3. Forbids member nations from sentencing convicted persons to any sort of cruel or barbaric punishment, including any form of torture, or the infliction of intense psychological harm or physical pain or suffering short of death;

4. Forbids member nations from executing any person for misdemeanors or nonviolent crimes;

5. Forbids member nations from executing children, pregnant persons, or persons of limited mental capacity;

6. Forbids member nations from sentencing any individual to death without due process;

7. Forbids member nations from carrying out summary executions;

8. Requires member nations to ban any form of execution that involves any physical pain or suffering that would be unnecessary to achieve a quick and relatively painless death;

9. Requires member nations to take every possible measure to ensure that innocent people are never executed, and further requires members to conduct regular studies of death-penalty cases to verify that proper legal procedures are followed before convicted persons are put to death;

10. Requires member nations to delay any execution wherein the accused may have been denied essential legal protections during their trial or appeal process, and not to carry out any death sentence until it can be verified that the convicted person was not unfairly or unlawfully condemned;

11. Requires member nations to treat the bodies of executed persons with respect, and to prevent the improper handling or desecration of their remains;

12. Forbids member nations from extraditing criminals to other jurisdictions not affected by this mandate, for purposes of avoiding their obligations under international law.

Reply

Could be worse. This proposal imposes more substantive restrictions on execution than its predecessor (Convention on Execution), including a proportionality requirement and a ban on the use of execution for misdemeanors and non-violent crimes. These are welcome additions. However, I would ultimately prefer a proposal banning executions except in cases where safe imprisonment is not possible. This proposal sadly doesn't go that far. It's a decent compromise, though, so I've voted in favour.

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Given that there's no actual danger in voting against capital punishment resolutions until one comes up that completely bans it -- since I no longer play IC -- I'm gonna vote no on anything short of a complete ban.

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Given that there's no actual danger in voting against capital punishment resolutions until one comes up that completely bans it -- since I no longer play IC -- I'm gonna vote no on anything short of a complete ban.

I don't think a complete ban would be workable for nations that quite literally lack any capacity to imprison people for extended periods of time, like nomadic societies or small, technologically underdeveloped or impoverished communities. Such nations may have to resort to capital punishment for violent crimes when the offender cannot be trusted not to re-offend.

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Countries not coughing up the funds to imprison people isn't any excuse to allow them to kill people instead... I don't really care at all about the logistics of it, or about respecting cultural tradition. Capital punishment is wrong and nobody should be doing it.

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Countries not coughing up the funds to imprison people isn't any excuse to allow them to kill people instead... I don't really care at all about the logistics of it, or about respecting cultural tradition. Capital punishment is wrong and nobody should be doing it.

I'm not talking about modern, developed states looking for an excuse to use capital punishment, or who use it simply because of "cultural traditions"; I'm talking about impoverished, technologically backward or failed states where there really isn't any other choice but to use capital punishment if law and order is to be maintained. Some countries may -- for whatever reason -- simply be unable to establish and maintain the institutions and infrastructure to keep violent criminals imprisoned for long periods of time. In my view, capital punishment would be appropriate under such circumstances.

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Crime and Punishment was passed 12,853 votes to 3,932.

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