dissident groups in Cuba asked Havana to grant a general amnesty to political prisoners and to introduce a legal moratorium on capital executions.

“Our Hands Off Cain is also valid for Saddam: thus, ‘hands off Saddam’, which does not equate to non-punishment, but physical wellbeing and human dignity”, stated Secretary and Treasurer of Hands Off Cain Sergio D’Elia and Elisabetta Zamparutti in commenting the prosecutors’ death penalty requests for the former Iraqi dictator.

a Saudi man condemned to death for murder was beheaded with a sword in the north of the country.

28-year-old Lamont Reese was put to death by lethal injection for killing three men in 1999 outside a Fort Worth convenience store.

“The request put forward by prosecutors to sentence Saddam Hussein to death will not bring justice to the genocides, torture and to the atrocious crimes against the Iraqi population committed by the former Baghdad strongman”.

a regional trial court in Bacolod City, the Philippines, meted out the death penalty to 28-year-old Guillermo Manayon Rama Jr. for the rape and killing of a 17-year-old high school student.

prosecutors demanded the death penalty for Saddam Hussein and three of his former aides for crimes against humanity following a 1982 crackdown on Shi'ites in which hundreds were killed and tortured after an attempt on the Iraqi leader's life in the village of Dujai.

two brothers who led a gang that held more than 100 people hostage were hanged in Alexandria.

three women were reported to have been hanged in Qazvin, west of Tehran.

the Iranian regime hanged a woman and a man in Iranshahr, southeast Iran.

it was reported that capital punishment would not be abolished in Benin. The decision was made by the government and a large number of parliamentarians during the week, holding it necessary to retain the death penalty in order to avoid turning the country into a refuge for international criminals.

Mohammad Khan was hanged in Faisalabad District Jail, Pakistan, in the morning hours.