China remains world's top executioner
The number of prisoners put to death worldwide decreased in 2008, a human rights group said on Wednesday, adding that China retained its position as the world's top executioner.The report said China accounted for at least 5,000 executions, or 87.3 percent of the total, the same estimate as last year. That estimate is far greater that on given earlier this year by Amnesty International, an international human rights group. Amnesty said China put at least 1,718 people to death in 2008. Hands Off Cain said Iran executed at least 346 people last year, down from 355 in 2007; Saudi Arabia put 102 people to death, while in 2007 it accounted for 166 executions. As of June 30, the number of executions in the two countries included four minors in Iran and three in Saudi Arabia, in violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the report said.
The Rome-based group also said a large number of executions were based on terrorism charges in Afghanistan, Indonesia, Iran and Iraq. China also ties repression against Tibetans and Uighurs, a Muslim minority in the country's restive far western region of Xinjiang, as part of the war on terrorism, it said. The United States executed 37 people, five fewer than 2007, continuing a downward trend in the country since 1999, when the number of executions peaked at 98
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