khaleejtimes.com, Mon Feb 26 22:40:39 EST 2007
THE advocacy of capital punishment as a means of arresting the growing crime rate in Sri Lanka is gaining currency. The support for and opposition to capital punishment depends on the experience one undergoes.
Those who have not been affected by a serious crime such as murder or robbery may see capital punishment as barbaric and inhuman. But the very same person who champions the message of mercy even for a mass murderer may justify capital punishment saying it serves as a deterrent when he becomes a victim.
At the funerals of victims of criminals, the call for the imposition of death penalty is loud and clear — with indignant relatives complaining about the inadequacy of our judicial and legal systems. "We must have strict laws and capital punishment like in Middle Eastern countries," one would hear them talk. But when four Sri Lankans were beheaded in Saudi Arabia and their bodies were publicly displayed, the uproar was universal. Condemnations came from every quarter. Saudi Arabia’s judicial system was torn to pieces. In the process, we all forgot the gravity of the crime the four Sri Lankans had committed. Actually, many in Sri Lanka still do not know why they were executed. It was only after they were executed that some background information began to trickle in — and that too from news agency reports. The reports said the four men were convicted of "forming a criminal gang which robbed a number of companies and threatened accountants and workers with weapons, shooting one of them and stealing his car".
Full Story
_________________
- The Academic

