CPN seminar about "Reservation or Abolishment of the Death Penalty under international law"

Dear all,

We are very happy to have Mr. Yunxin Tu as the speaker of our second CPN seminar of this year. He will talk about "Reservation or Abolishment of the Death Penalty under international law". Mr. Tu is currently a Master law student at the Department of Public and International Law, University of Oslo. His main subjects are International and European Union law, International Ciminal law and International Environmental law. In addition, he is working at the Norwegian Center for Human Rights as a research assistant, with the main activities on Public International Law research and programs related to China. During these year, Mr. Tu has also been participated in several international court competitions. On April 26th he will specifically address the legal issue of death penalty, which has been a heated topic globally. Attached are the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) both in English and Chinese for background information and for discussion. Any one, who would like to learn about the current situation of death penalty around the world and/or join the discussion afterwards, is welcome to this seminar.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Title: Reservation or Abolishment of the Death Penalty under international law

-------- From the view of Article 6 (1) ICCPR

国际法背景下的死刑存废论

----- 以《公民权利和政治权利国际公约》第六条第一款为视角

Speaker: Mr. Yunxin Tu, from the Faculty of Law, UiO
Time: April 26th, 2010, Monday, 18:00 - 20:00

Language: Chinese
Place: Undervisningsrom 3 (3rd floor) in the UiO's new library building (indicated by the orange arrows on the map at http://www.cpn2003.org/?q=en/node/255).

Abstract:

Death penalty(DP), from a legal perspective, is the killing of a person by a state authority through judicial process as a punishment for an offense. However, Since 1764, when the criminal law pioneer Italian Cesare Beccaria in his famous work "On Crimes and Punishments" systematically demonstrated the cruelty of the death penalty, the injustice and non-necessity, the legitimacy of DP has been suspected and challenged by more and more people across the world, and the abolitionist movements of the death penalty have never been stopped. According to statistics by Amnesty International (up to August 2008), currently 95 countries had abolished capital punishment, 9 had done so for all offences except under special circumstances (i.e War crimes), and 35 had not used it for at least 10 years or were under a moratorium. The other 58 actively retained the death penalty (China included).At present the existence of DP has been not only a purely domestic legal issue but also an international legal issue which is increasingly influenced by human rights law.International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights( ICCPR) Article 6(1) put it like this: Every human being has the inherent right to life. This right shall be protected by law. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life. And furthermore under Chapter III (section 5 )of the China's Criminal Code there are clear provisions regarding DP. While Chinese National People's Congress (NPC) has put the discussion on the desk to ratify ICCPR (China is already a member, but not ratified), how to approach this issue (the DP abolition) and how to understand it in the domestic legal sphere ? This seminar is aiming to address this legal issue based on Article 6 (1) of ICCPR.

摘要：

死刑，从法学意义上讲，是指一个国家基于法律所赋予的权力，通过法院的审判结束一个人生命的刑罚。然而，自1764年近代刑法学鼻祖意大利人贝卡利亚在其名著《论犯罪与刑罚》中系统地论证了死刑的残酷性、非正义性和不必要性后，死刑的合理性越来越为更多的人所怀疑，死刑存废之争更是从未停止过。根据国际特赦组织的权威统计（截止到2008年6月），现今有95国明确废除死刑，9国规定只在特殊环境下执行死刑（比如战争罪），有35国虽然规定死刑但近10年内并无死刑执行案例，剩下58国仍然保留死刑。死刑的存废之争，已经不是一个纯粹的国内法的问题，它越来越强烈地受到国际法尤其是国际人权法的影响。《公民权利和政治权利国际公约》（简称《公约》）第六条第一款规定：“人人有固有的生命权，这个权利应受法律保护。不得任意剥夺任何人的生命。” 中国刑法第三章第五节对于死刑的适用设有专门的规定，随着中国全国人民代表大会（以下简称“人大”）日渐倾向于批准《公约》（中国已经加入，但未批准），废除死刑在国内法意义上应该如何去看待和理解呢？ 本此研讨会将以《公约》第六条第一款为起点探讨此问题。
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If you have any question or suggestion, please feel free to contact Yong Lin (angeline_lin @ hotmail.com, tel: ***83354) or Tianyu Mai (tianyumai @ hotmail.com, tel: ***83385).

Best regards,
Yong Lin and Tianyu Mai (on behalf of CPN Board)