Michelle Bachelet remark got here after a Bangladesh court docket sentenced 5 males to demise Thursday (File)
Geneva, Switzerland:
Sentencing rapists to demise, as Bangladesh did Thursday, isn’t an acceptable punishment even for such a heinous crime, the UN rights chief stated.
“Tempting as it could be to impose draconian punishments on those that perform such monstrous acts, we should not enable ourselves to commit additional violations,” Michelle Bachelet stated in a press release.
Her remark got here after a Bangladesh court docket sentenced 5 males to demise Thursday for the 2012 gang-rape of a 15-year-old lady.
It marked the primary conviction because the authorities of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina this week launched the demise penalty for rape.
Gang-rape already carried the demise sentence, however rape by a single offender had beforehand been punishable solely by life imprisonment.
Bachelet cited the legislation change in Bangladesh, but additionally calls in plenty of different international locations to impose the demise penalty for rape.
She highlighted calls in Pakistan for public hanging and castration of rapists, and a legislation launched within the northwestern Nigerian state of Kaduna final month imposing surgical castration adopted by execution in rape instances the place the sufferer is beneath 14.
“The principle argument being made for the demise penalty is for it to discourage rape – however the truth is there is no such thing as a proof that the demise penalty deters crime greater than different types of punishment,” Bachelet stated.
“Proof reveals that the understanding of punishment, moderately than its severity, deters crime.”
She burdened that in most international locations, “the important thing downside is that victims of sexual violence would not have entry to justice within the first place.”
This was because of a spread of things, together with “stigma, concern of reprisals, entrenched gender stereotypes and energy imbalances,” she stated, stressing that handing the demise penalty to perpetrators wouldn’t take away these boundaries.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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