World Bulletin
Mongolia Joins Other Countries in Abolishing Capital Punishment
In a country where death sentences remain state secrets, the president steps boldly into democracy.
By Indra Baatarkhuu
Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj, president of Mongolia, at the UN in 2009. Marco Castro/UN Photo |
May 14 – Mongolia, a country that was governed by Communist rule for 70 years until 1990, dropped the death penalty earlier this year in a move that not only advances its human-rights standards but also reflects its efforts to join two-thirds of the world’s countries in moving away from capital punishment.
While many Asian countries continue to execute their citizens, and the United States was the only country in the Americas to carry out executions in 2009, the number of countries refusing to use capital punishment continues to rise. Last year, Burundi and Togo, in sub-Saharan Africa, did away with capital punishment, making the total number of countries worldwide that have removed the practice from their laws to 95.
No executions were carried out in Europe and Russia as well last year, for the first time since Amnesty International has been keeping records on the procedure.
The successes follow decisions by the United Nations General Assembly in 2007 and 2008 calling for a global moratorium on executions as a first step to total abolition, even though Mongolia voted against these resolutions. A similar resolution will be considered by the General Assembly in late 2010. International human rights groups also campaigned in Mongolia against capital punishment.
Despite progress in Mongolia and elsewhere, more than 700 people were executed in 18 countries in 2009, excluding an estimate of thousands in China. Asia executes more people than the rest of the world combined, Amnesty International reports, and the region is notorious for lack of transparency, where administration of executions is rendered state secrets in China, North Korea and Vietnam.
A New President in Place
Politics in Mongolia turned the tide away from capital punishment with the 2009 presidential election of Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj, a member of the Democratic Party. The country adopted a moratorium against capital punishment in January 2010.
“The path of democratic Mongolia must be clean and bloodless,” Elbegdorj said in a speech on Jan. 14, 2010. “Only when the death penalty is abolished, shall we be able to genuinely enhance the value of human life and human rights and create conditions to safeguard them.”
The step was hailed by the UN as setting a leadership example for the region.
“Unfortunately, the Asian region includes some of the world's most prolific executioners, but also some countries like Mongolia that have taken a principled stand on this fundamental issue,” said Navi Pillay, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a statement.
Mongolia, a country of about 3 million sandwiched in Central Asia between Russia and China, was also the first Asian Communist country to become democratic in 1990 as perestroika took place in the Soviet Union. Mongolia’s government is parliamentary with an elected president.
Pillay has urged the country to quickly ratify the second optional protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which commits countries to the full abolition of the death penalty. Technically, capital punishment remains legal in Mongolia until the Great Khural, or Mongolian Parliament, amends the country’s criminal code. The Great Khural is now dominated by the opposition party, many of whose members still favor harsh punishment for criminals and are former members of the Communist Party.
Through the constitution, the president has the authority to commute death sentences, and Elbegdorj has granted 30-year prison sentences, commuting death sentences to at least three people.
In Mongolia, death sentences are classified as state secrets, and the official statistics on death sentences and executions are not available. Families of those on death row are not notified ahead of the execution, and the bodies of those executed are not returned to the family.
UN’s Role
The UN has been actively involved in the country’s process of building a democratic society, a goal adopted in Mongolia’s constitution 18 years ago.
Besides carrying out many of the Millennium Development Goals, the UN Development Program developed a country-specific goal in Mongolia to “foster democratic governance and strengthen human rights.” This effort focuses on three additional targets, which are respect for human rights, freedom of the press and the right to information; promoting democratic values; and zero tolerance toward corruption.
Like the US, Mongolia will also undergo the universal periodic review of the Human Rights Council in late November. Each year, 48 countries’ rights records are evaluated by a panel, which makes recommendations for improvements. Besides fully removing capital punishment from the law, Mongolia’s prison conditions and cases of torture are bound to be topics on human-rights groups’ agendas.
Indra Baatarkhuu is a publications intern with UNA-USA and a student at the Bard College Globalization and International Affairs Program in New York City.
|