ADPAN e-newsletter (Jan-March 2009)
This ADPAN newsletter re-instates e-news and introduces a feature article designed to showcase the work of ADPAN member Murder Victims Families for Human Rights (MVFHR
As before, the aim of e-news is to provide selected press reports, by country, that indicate the most relevant debates, trends, changes to policy/law and the most high profile stories within individual countries on the issue of the death penalty.
If the feature article proves useful for members, future editions will include similar articles that showcase the work of individual ADPAN member organisations, or profile important thematic or country issues. Please let me know if you would like your organisation or a country/thematic death penalty issue to be profiled. This will better enable fellow ADPAN members to contribute to, collaborate with or take advantage of your campaigning initiatives and raise awareness of key concerns. Of course any other feedback on what you find useful or would find useful in future editions would be much appreciated.
Feature
MURDER VICTIMS FAMILIES FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
At the Hong Kong ADPAN meeting (13-15 June 2008), Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights (MVFHR) presented photos and individual testimonies from China, Taiwan and the USA. Most ADPAN members who participated in the meeting found the presentation provided insight, argument and useful materials for our campaigns.
To follow up from this work, Renny Cushing, Executive Director Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights (MVFHR) and I recently discussed MVFHR and ADPAN collaboration during the next year. Renny powerfully conveyed the value MVFHR can bring to the work of fellow ADPAN members through direct collaboration; by citing MVFHR in argument; or by using MVFHR insight and experience to inform campaign activities. Central to the influencing power of MVFHR is the voice and message of its members. To help demonstrate this message this article therefore draws upon the personal testimony Renny shared during our conversation.
Murder Victims' Families for Human Rights (MVFHR) defines itself as an international organization, based in the United States, of family members of victims of criminal murder, state execution, extra-judicial assassination and enforced disappearance, who oppose the death penalty in all cases.
MVFHR challenges the assumption that all survivors of homicide victims support the death penalty.
Personal experience and work with hundreds of victims' families has taught MVFHR the destructive potential of this assumption for survivors. Soon after his father was killed, Renny was subjected to the comment “I hope those people fry so your family can get some peace.” This alerted Renny to the commonly held false perception that, once a family member has been lost to homicide, the survivors would automatically support the death penalty. MVFHR has found that such messages are communicated to survivors by society through lawmakers, prosecutors, even friends. This adds an additional psychological burden at a time already filled with grief, anger and shock, and can form a contributory factor to the stigma and isolation that many survivors feel.
How many times do we hear arguments that use the survivors of murder victims as justification for the death penalty?
MVFHR say "do not kill in my name." Its members view the death penalty not as a criminal sanction but as a human rights violation that creates new victims and survivors.
The actual needs of survivors are complex and may go unnoticed, as attention focuses almost entirely on perpetrators. There is simply not enough consciousness or sensitivity to victims' needs or victims' experience in the aftermath of murder, and what impact specific actions or policies, or lack of policies, might have. Two weeks after watching her husband murdered in front of her eyes, Renny's mother received a letter in the post. It was a bill for the ambulance that took him from the murder scene. When she opened this mail she said, “I can't believe I have to pay for my husband's murder.” This hurt. Not the bill, but the insensitivity of society. Renny realised that nobody purposely wanted to re-traumatize Marie Cushing two weeks after her husband was killed. The ambulance bill was yet another example of the lack of thought about victims' experience in the aftermath of murder.
MVFHR advocates for all victims to receive support on a non discriminatory basis and without regard to whether they support the death penalty. In other words, victims' families who oppose the death penalty should have the same access to information, victim assistance and so on, as victims’ families who support the death penalty. This non-discriminatory principle furthermore recognises families of those executed by the state as survivors who also have entitlement to support.
MVFHR seeks to re-focus society's attention in order to better meet the actual needs of survivors.
MVFHR asks, “What should society do so that a victim is not forgotten when a murder takes place? How can a society help remove the stigma that survivors of murder victims feel.”
Opposition to the death penalty is often assumed to be the same as opposition to criminal sanction, incapacitation or accountability. This is most certainly not the case! MVFHR resolutely calls for all perpetrators of homicide to be brought to justice, robust efforts to be put into law enforcement; and proper attention to be put into preventing violence. By contrast, MVFHR believe that the death penalty role models violence and death as a solution.
Work with ADPAN
This article has focused on the personal experience underlying the work of MVFHR. MVFHR is committed to publicly communicating its voice and message to bring an end to the death penalty; to make other survivors aware of alternatives; and to help decrease their sense of isolation. Using its advocacy strength, MVFHR is able to utilise its message to push for law and policy change and, resource permitting, contribute or participate as an ADPAN member to lobbying delegations.
With this in mind, MVFHR have joined the list of organisations that will write an OP ED as part of the ADPAN contribution to the forthcoming series of OP EDs in Japan.
In 2007, MVFHR participated in Taiwan's “Victims, We Care” speaking tour and helped to launch its first affiliate, the Japanese group Ocean. Ocean, which stands for “new life and new hope,” held its first annual conference in the summer of 2008, and has just released a Japanese edition of MVFHR's Gallery of Victims' Stories.
For 2009/10 MVFHR are considering how they can take forward their work and message in China, Japan, South Korea, Tai Wan and would be interested to hear about or contribute to other initiatives in the Asia Pacific region.
For more information please visit the MVFHR blog, “For Victims, Against the Death Penalty” at:
http://www.mvfhr.blogspot.com/
Meetings
ADPAN MEETING at 4th World Congress 25th To 27th February 2010, Geneva, Switzerland
Following the success of the ADPAN roundtable at the 2007 World Congress, the organisers have offered space for ADPAN to have a meeting with up to 12 ADPAN members for one day at the venue, the « Centre International des Conférences de Genève » in advance of the Congress meeting i.e. on Tuesday 23rd February 2010.
This could be an excellent opportunity for ADPAN members to review ADPAN achievements and challenges, and to discuss how to take ADPAN forward during a roundtable discussion. If you have not already done so, please let me know if you will be attending the 2010 World congress and would be able to participate in this meeting.
MIGRANT WORKERS FROM ASIA FACING DP IN SAUDI ARABIA
“AN AFFRONT TO JUSTICE” – translation to Asian languages
The translations of the digest version of this report are now complete and have thus been provided to ADPAN members along with this newsletter. As a reminder, the report highlights the dire situation for migrant workers alleged to have committed crimes sanctioned by death in Saudi.
These translations are intended to support actions on behalf of individuals that hail from Asia and are suffering under the Saudi death penalty system, and to help ADPAN members' to broaden their national support base for work on the death penalty and the affected migrant workers.
We have translated languages understood to be most pertinent to Asia's affected migrant workers that can assist campaigning: Bengali, Hindi, Indonesian Bahasa, Sinhalese, Tagalog, Tamil and Urdu.
Campaign Digest in Asian Languages:
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/MDE23/031/2008/en
Last year we took action for Indian Nationals Sheikh Mastan and Hamza Abu Bakir (ADPAN 58/08) - condemned to death in Saudi Arabia after a trial in which they had no legal representation. Following from this work, and in addition to the campaign digest, I have included links to case cards representing individuals from Indonesia and Sri Lanka that activists within these countries can utilise. These are therefore translated only to the languages pertaining to the individuals' country of origin.
Case cards:
Sita (Bahasa): http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/MDE23/032/2008/en
Rizana (Sinhala and Tamil): http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/MDE23/034/2008/en
Country e-news >>>