appConfigEntityId

bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

articlePageQuery

filter

article

articleBaseAdvertisingInfoArticle

articleListArticle

articleSeoArticle

hooksArticleAcknowledgementGateOverlayArticle

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

hooksContentInterestArticle

articleLinkingDataContent

hooksAmpRedirectArticle

articleSchemaContent

hooksArticlePageAdvertisementConfigArticle

liveArticle

appConfig

advertZone

sentiment

contentLock

topics

types

sections

paywallTypes

createdDate

publishedDate

sponsorType

urlAlias

moreOnThisArticles

sectionsV2

commentCount

authorLocations

authors

corrections

displaySlideShow

multimediaEmbed

printHeadline

seriesContainer

articleSpeeches

socialHeadline

headline

images

flag

firstTopic

glossary

flattenTypeIds

image

relatedLinks

relatedNewsletters

__typename

sponsor

pdfFiles

seriesReverseOrder

series

disableOffPlatformContent

published

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

body

keywords

readingTime

customTimezone

liveContents

json

Agence France-Presse

Taiwan’s claim to be a regional bastion of human rights is undermined by its retention of capital punishment, activists say as they campaign to exonerate the island’s oldest death row prisoner.
Wang Xin-fu is among 38 inmates in Taiwan awaiting execution, which is carried out by gunshot and without advance notice once all appeals are exhausted.
At 69, Wang is Taiwan’s most elderly prisoner on death row and has consistently maintained his innocence.
Rights groups led by the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty (TAEDP) have launched a campaign to exonerate Wang, arguing he was wrongfully convicted as a joint offender for the murder of a policeman in 1990.


Wang had been detained in his youth and classified by Taiwan’s then authoritarian government as a “thug”.
He was sentenced to death for supplying a gun to a “lackey” and ordering him to shoot the victim, based on testimonies from the shooter and witnesses.
But activists claim there are “obvious flaws” in the conviction, from inconsistent testimony, allegations of police torture against a witness, a lack of motive and no fingerprints.
“He is a so-called bad guy, but bad guys also have rights. He should not be sentenced for a crime that’s not his doing,” said Lin Hsin-yi, executive director of TAEDP.
Wang fled to mainland China after learning he was wanted and was only arrested in 2006 upon returning to Taiwan for treatment of an eye ailment.
He was convicted and the supreme court upheld his death sentence in a final ruling in 2011.
In November activists appealed to the Control Yuan, Taiwan’s top government watchdog, after the office of the top prosecutor rejected their request to file a “special appeal” for Wang – one of the only ways to challenge a final conviction.
That tactic has previously worked. In 2018, the Control Yuan recommended the prosecutor-general file a special appeal for death row prisoner Hsieh Chih-hung, who had been jailed for 19 years for murder. That eventually led to his acquittal.
Now a free man, Hsieh campaigns for abolishing the death penalty, saying his and other exonerations show the capital punishment system is fallible.
Campaigners point to one of Taiwan’s most disputed and lengthy cases, when a court in 2012 quashed the convictions of three men sentenced to death over the murder of a couple two decades ago, after they had undergone a string of trials and retrials.
Another high-profile case came the year before when a military court declared that an air force private executed 14 years previously for the rape and murder of a five-year-old girl was innocent.
Chinese man gets death penalty after killing mum to ‘save her’
“The government thinks carrying out executions is the will of the people but does that really solve the problems?” Hsieh said.
Another death row prisoner that activists campaign for is Chiou Ho-shun, who has been incarcerated for more than three decades.
Capital punishment remains popular in Taiwan. Despite its frequent use against dissidents during decades of martial law, most polls show Taiwanese still support the death penalty even as the island has become one of the most progressive democracies in Asia.
Some 35 prisoners have been put to death since 2010 when Taiwan resumed executions after a four-year hiatus, including two since President Tsai Ing-wen took office in 2016.


Activists have criticised Tsai’s government – which has embraced progressive issues such as gay marriage – for continuing with the executions.
Tsai has called abolishing capital punishment “a difficult issue to deal with” due to the lack of support from the public that would require “a long process, a long time” to change.
The justice ministry said it restarted a task force in 2017 aimed at facilitating gradual abolition and has been studying alternatives while trying to build a public consensus.
“Abolishing the death penalty is an international trend in recent years and it’s the long-term direction our country has been working on,” the ministry said in a statement.
Opponents want a moratorium on executions and a timeline for complete abolition.
“If people know there are alternatives they won’t necessarily support the death penalty, especially if they are aware of wrongful convictions,” activist Lin said.
She said one alternative was lifetime incarceration on condition that the convict work in prison with part of their wages going to the victims’ families as compensation.
All Wang’s family can do is wait. His sister Wen Mei-hui, 60, said she was hopeful her brother would be reunited with her as a free man.
“I am convinced he’s innocent,” she said. “I hope the authorities will let my brother go home.”


China warns EU to remove firms and citizens from Russian sanctions list

2-speed recovery hits Central landlords as older towers cut rents to compete

Did China just drop a hint that its next aircraft carrier will be nuclear-powered?

Macron touches Beijing’s nerves on Taiwan and Tibet as he heads for the exit

Taiwan

Taiwanese death row inmate’s case turns focus on use of capital punishment

Activists campaign at the Control Yuan in Taipei with a life-sized placard of Taiwan’s oldest death row inmate Wang Xin-fu. Photo: AFP

Japan on brink of granting Australian troops immunity from death penalty

Japan is negotiating an agreement that will cover the jurisdiction of Australian troops in its territory. Photo: AP

Protesters hold placards that read: "Our anger has reached its limit" during a protest rally against the presence of U.S. military bases on the southwestern island of Okinawa in Naha, Okinawa, Sunday, June 19, 2016 as many of them wearing black to mourn the rape and killing of a local woman in which a former U.S. Marine is a suspect. The rally called for a review of the U.S.-Japanese security agreement, which burdens Okinawa with hosting the bulk of American troops in Japan. (Ryosuke Uematsu/Kyodo News via AP) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT

This handout photo released by the Indian Navy on October 12, 2020 shows ships during the second phase of the Malabar naval exercise in which India, Australia, Japan and the U.S are taking part in the Bay of Bengal in the Indian Ocean. (Photo by - / INDIAN NAVY / AFP) / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO /Indian Navy" - NO MARKETING - NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS

China rejects Canadian Robert Lloyd Schellenberg’s appeal against drug smuggling death penalty

Robert Lloyd Schellenberg faced a retrial in 2019 and had his sentence upgraded to the death penalty. Photo: Reuters

‘Black Widow’ case shows Japan’s support for death penalty is alive and kicking

Japanese woman Chisako Kakehi, who has been dubbed Japan’s ‘Black Widow’ for poisoning her husband and lovers with cyanide. Photo: AFP

The Kyoto District Court sentences to death Chisako Kakehi, 70, a serial killer dubbed Japan's "black widow" on Nov. 7, 2017 for the murders of her husband and two common-law partners, as well as the attempted murder of an acquaintance, between 2007 and 2013. (Pool photo)(Kyodo) ==Kyodo

Peole line up seeking admission tickets for a judgment trial of Chisako Kakehi at the Kyoto district court on November 7, 2017. Kakehi, a one-time millionairess dubbed the "Black Widow" over the untimely deaths of lovers and a husband, was sentenced to death on November 7, 2017, in a high-profile murder case that has gripped Japan. / AFP PHOTO / JIJI PRESS / STR / Japan OUT / JAPAN POOL

News

China

Politics


Campaigners say Wang Xin-fu, the island’s oldest death row prisoner, was wrongly convicted for the murder of a policeman in 1990
Although relatively progressive, Taiwan retains the death penalty and the sentence has remained popular



Campaigners say Wang Xin-fu, the island’s oldest death row prisoner, was wrongly convicted for the murder of a policeman in 1990.


Human rights in China