The Edition
facebook icon twitter icon instagram icon linkedin icon

Latest

Maldives top court upholds third death sentence

Mohamed Visham
26 July 2016, MVT 11:52
Mohamed Nabeel being led away after the Supreme Court upheld his death sentence on Monday. PHOTO/MIHAARU
Mohamed Visham
26 July 2016, MVT 11:52

Maldives top court on Monday upheld the third sentence since the government ended a de facto moratorium on executions last year.

Mohamed Nabeel was sentenced to death by Juvenile Court in 2010, for the murder of Abdulla Farhad on March 8, 2009.

The death sentence was upheld by the High Court upon appeal and the state had initiated the final appeal as per new regulations.

Farhad was attacked in a park in the capital Male by a group including Nabeel. After Farhad made an attempt to flee, he was stabbed in the back with a box cutter by Nabeel.

Doctor’s report on Farhad’s death said the wound on his back as the cause of death.

Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed while delivering the verdict said Nabeel had admitted stabbing the victim during the police investigation while the defendant's own brother had testified to the stabbing.

Judge Saeed also dismissed arguments of coercion by the defence by pointing out that the video footage of Nabeel's testimony proved that his statement was not forced or coerced.

The sentence came hours after the Supreme Court quashed a stay order on executions effectively blocking any future challenge to the implementation of the death penalty.

Maldives Democracy Network (MDN) a local rights group had filed a case at the High Court seeking to annul some clauses in the death penalty regulation.

The High Court bench ignored state arguments to issue the stay order on executions.

However, hours after the order was issued, the Supreme Court late Sunday went above the first appellate court highlighting that it had upheld two death sentences under the capital punishment regulation.

“As the Supreme Court has the final say in cases, the high court stay order was baseless and invalid from the outset,” the ruling read.

The ruling would effectively end the case filed by MDN and the High Court would not be able to hear any cases related to the death penalty regulation.

The Supreme Court has annulled a stay order days after the United Nations had urged the government to hold off on the execution of the 22 year old man convicted of killing a prominent lawmaker.

The top court had upheld the death sentence of Hussain Humam Ahmed convicted of MP Dr Afrasheem Ali’s murder which could make him the first person to be executed in the Maldives for more than 50 years.

Humam’s lawyer Abdulla Haseen had told Mihaaru that the stay order was issued after his clients father filed a case at the UN human rights committee arguing that the trial had violated the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).

“This is a convention Maldives is party to. And Maldives is obligated to honour it,” Haseen had said.

According to Haseen, the UN had asked for a government response within six months.

The Maldives government has been asked to postpone the execution until the UN rules on the case, he added.

However, hours after being appointed as the new foreign minister Dr Mohamed Asim told reporters that the UN had only sent a “note verbal” informing that it had received the case.

The note did not ask for a specific action from the government, he stressed.

The ruling on Humam’s case came two weeks before the top court upheld the death sentence handed to a 32-year-old man convicted of murdering a prominent lawyer.

Ahmed Murrath was convicted along with his girlfriend of killing a prominent lawyer, Ahmed Najeeb, whose mutilated body was found stuffed in a dustbin in July 2012.

Both Humam and Murrath had claimed coercion in their respective confessions which were ignored by the top court.

Humam’s case had sparked international concern The stay order on Humam’s execution comes a day after European Union (EU) jointly with eight nations have issued a diplomatic demarche urging the Maldives government to stop its efforts to implement the death penalty in the archipelago.

Top diplomats of the EU, UK, Netherlands, Switzerland, Italy, Norway, France, Canada and Australia had delivered the demarche which is used to request for support of a policy or protest another government’s policy to the Maldivian High Commissioner in Sri Lanka, Zahiya Zareer.

The demarche had urged the government to continue to apply the de facto moratorium on executions as a first step towards its abolition.

“The death penalty fails to deter criminal behaviour and represents a grave denial of human dignity and integrity,” the demarche read.

“Any miscarriage of justice – which is inevitable in any legal system – is irreversible”after the court ignored a plea by Afrasheem’s family to hold off the death penalty citing an incomplete investigation.

The Supreme Court had also rejected defence’s claim of mental illness.

Renowned Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan had urged the Maldives government to halt Humam’s execution insisting that the question marks surrounding the sentence would make the execution contravene the fundamental principles of Islamic law.

Ramadan joins four UN rights experts, the EU and Amnesty International to urge the government continue to apply the de facto moratorium on executions.

MORE ON NEWS