the number of executions in China is a state secret, but Liu Renwen, a scholar at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said he agreed with estimates in academic circles that the figure was likely to be about 8,000 a year.

all death penalty appeals must be heard in an open court from the latter half of this year to better protect human rights, China's chief justice Xiao Yang announced.

a young man from the town of Ardebil, north-western Iran, was hanged in prison.

an Iranian man convicted of rape was hanged in a prison in the northern city of Qazvin, the Etemad Melli newspaper reported.

two Taiwanese nationals convicted of drug trafficking were executed in southern China's Guangdong province after being convicted of possessing 12 kilograms (26.4 pounds) of the methamphetamine ice.

several members of the Arizona House and Senate recently offered apologies to Ray Krone, a former Arizona death row inmate who was freed in 2002 following new DNA tests.

convicted murderers facing the death penalty do not have a constitutional right at sentencing to offer new evidence seeking to cast doubt on their guilt, the US Supreme Court ruled unanimously.

a Pakistani court sentenced 11 militants to death for an assassination attempt on Lieutenant General Ahsan Saleem Hayat in 2004 in which 11 people were killed.

for the first time since taking office in 2001, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo categorically stated that she was for scrapping capital punishment and that she would see to the immediate passage of legislation to abolish the Death Penalty Law.

Hands Off Cain Treasurer Elisabetta Zamparutti made the following statement regarding the events surrounding the case of Michael Angelo Morales: “States which have recently passed from the electric chair, from hanging or from death by firing squad to that by lethal injection have presented their changes as advances in civility and as a more humane and painless way of executing a condemned person.

the US state of California has cancelled the execution of Michael Morales over ethical issues surrounding the lethal injection method. The state told courts it could not comply with an order for a medical professional to administer a lethal dose of barbiturate to Morales. Morales was convicted of the rape and murder of a 17-year-old girl in 1981.

the Justice Ministry announced today it will review the possibility of replacing capital punishment with life imprisonment without parole or pardon to meet the rising number of calls on enhancing the protection of human rights.