Justice Minister Ayman Odeh

JORDAN: EXPERTS PROPOSE DEATH PENALTY ANNULMENT IN STATE SECURITY CASES

April 5, 2009: the death penalty will be abolished in Jordan for all crimes except premeditated murder if recent amendments to the Kingdom’s Penal Code pass through an extraordinary session of the House.
Justice Minister Ayman Odeh said "the death penalty will still be imposed on premeditated murders."
"The amendments include the replacement of the death penalty on six different state security crimes including terrorism, espionage and treason, with life sentence with hard labour,” Odeh explained.
However, Odeh denied that international calls on the government to completely remove the death penalty played any role in the proposed amendment.
The last execution in Jordan took place in March 2006 and there are currently more than 40 people on death row in the country, including five women. Jordan abolished the death penalty for drug, weapons and explosives crimes in August 2006.
Reducing the number of crimes eligible for capital punishment is one of the changes that have been proposed by an ad hoc Justice Ministry committee comprising judges, lawyers and jurists tasked with updating Jordan’s Penal Code. The group has been meeting since August 2008 to address what the ministry sees as loopholes in the current legal system.
The minister said that the entire list of the committee’s recommendations will be distributed to a number of civil society entities, law institutions and local human rights organisations for feedback before the final draft is referred to Cabinet before the end of the month. (Sources: Jordan Times, 06/04/2009)