Statement Strongly Protesting Today’s Execution and Calling for an Immediate Moratorium and the Abolition of the Death Penalty

• Japanese

 

Today, a death row inmate was executed at the Fukuoka Detention House, the first execution authorized by the current Minister of Justice Masako Mori. It marked the 17th execution carried out under Prime Minister Abe’s administration, from his second cabinet through to the current fourth cabinet. The total number of convicts executed during that period has now reached 39.

The Japan Federation of Associations (JFBA) adopted its “Declaration Calling for Reform of the Penal System Including Abolition of the Death Penalty” during the 59th JFBA Convention on the Protection of Human Rights on October 7, 2016, and has called on the Japanese government to aim for the abolition of the death penalty by 2020 when Japan hosts the UN Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice.

A life taken by crime can never be brought back, and such crimes should never be tolerated. Therefore, it is quite understandable for bereaved family members, who lost their loved ones to crime, to seek severe punishment against the offender. Society as a whole is under a moral obligation to render sufficient support to victims of crime and their family members who have had to endure this most painful experience.

Meanwhile, however, the penal system should fundamentally serve not only the purpose of achieving retribution for crimes, but also the rehabilitation of offenders, which will help prevent recidivism, and consequently lead to the achievement of increased safety throughout society as a whole. To this end, the penal system (admittedly including the death penalty) should be reviewed in its entirety and, in deliberating the overall reform of the penal system, the Government needs to take note of the fact that the death penalty is the punishment that allows the state to deprive people of the right to life, which is at the core of fundamental human rights, as proclaimed in Article 13 of the Constitution of Japan, as well as Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The four cases of exonerations in the 1980s, wherein the defendants’ death sentences were overturned after retrials, serve as an important reminder that the risks of wrongful conviction and miscarriages of justice are very tangible and real.

An opinion poll, conducted by the Cabinet Office in November 2014, revealed that 80.3% of respondents replied that the “death penalty was unavoidable.” However, among such respondents, 40.5% said, in response to an additional question, that “the death penalty could be abolished in the future if the situation changes.” With regard to the question of whether or not the death penalty should be abolished in cases where the penalty of life imprisonment without parole was introduced, 37.7% of all respondents said that the death penalty should be abolished. This suggests that the situation where the death penalty is retained on the grounds of the support by a large majority of the public could be changed under conditions wherein sufficient information about the death penalty is provided and alternatives to the death penalty are explored simultaneously.

From an international perspective, more than two-thirds of the nations in the world have already abolished the death penalty in law or practice (as of December 2018). Among the member countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), only three countries retain the death penalty, namely, Japan, the Republic of Korea and the United States (USA), among which only Japan retains the death penalty in both law and practice as state policy.

In this way, there is a strong trend towards abolishing the death penalty in the international community, which can be recognized by the resolution calling for a moratorium on the death penalty adopted by the UN General Assembly on December 17, 2018 gaining a record number of votes in favor. Only a small number of nations still retain the death penalty and actually carry out executions. In this regard, Japan has been continuously subjected to various recommendations by the UN Human Rights Committee, the UN Committee Against Torture, and the UN Human Rights Council, to cease executions and to favorably consider abolishing the death penalty.

Additionally, following the executions conducted in 2018 in Japan, the statements that call for the abolition of the death penalty were announced in succession by EU Representatives, the Ambassadors to Japan of the EU member nations, the Human Rights Policy Committee of Germany, the France Ambassador to Japan, among others.

Moreover, in the “Declaration of the Bar Associations and Law Societies of the G7 Countries against the Death Penalty” released on July 11, 2019, the bar associations and law societies of the G7 Countries (except for the United States) and the Council of Bars and Societies of Europe (CCBE) proclaimed that they strongly oppose the death penalty under any circumstances and consider it a violation of the first right of any human being, the right to life, and request all countries where the death penalty still exists prioritize its abolition as a matter of urgency.

The Government should respond to the message calling for the abolition of the death penalty from the international community by actually abolishing the system. Japan would thereby attain a higher international reputation, and it could be recognized that Japan has established a favorable environment for the Olympic and the Paralympic Games as well as the Congress to be held in Japan in 2020.

Through this statement, the JFBA hereby strongly protests the executions conducted today, and reiterates its position that the Government should immediately suspend all executions, looking towards the total abolition of the death penalty system in Japan.