KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s Human Rights Commission today expressed its deep regret over the decision made by the government of Singapore to execute Malaysian citizen Prabu Pathmanathan for drug trafficking in Singapore.
Quoting its chairman Tan Sri Razali Ismail, Suhakam in a statement emphasised that UN’s multilateral treaty, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), had made the exception for the imposition of the death penalty only for the “most serious” crimes.
“This has been repeatedly interpreted by the Human Rights Committee responsible for the interpretation of the Covenant, that drug offences do not meet this threshold,” it said.
In the statement, SUHAKAM called for the government of Singapore to move in the direction of universal consciousness towards taking all necessary measures to abolish the death penalty.
”SUHAKAM is again deeply disappointed that Singapore continues to seek recourse to draconian practices that contravene the fundamental right to life and progressive civilisational norms,” it said.
On Dec 31, 2014, Prabu, 31, was sentenced to death for trafficking 227.82g of diamorphine, or heroin, into the island republic.
Lawyers of Liberty adviser N Surendran, who had been leading efforts to commute Pathmanathan’s sentence, said there were doubts surrounding Prabu’s conviction as the drugs were found in a vehicle driven by another person, and not Prabu.
Prabu, who was on death row in Singapore since 2014, was executed early this morning.
