Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-11-17-Speech-4-198"
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"en.20051117.22.4-198"2
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".
Mr President, the Commission is extremely concerned by the retention of the death penalty law in the Philippines and the omission by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to reinstate the moratorium on the death penalty lifted on 1 January 2004.
The EU stance against the death penalty is based on the firm belief in the inherent dignity of all human beings and the inviolability of the human person. The Member States, together with the Commission, have strengthened their international activities in opposition to the death penalty as an integral part of EU human rights policy. They have also adopted EU guidelines laying down the basic principles to be followed in this respect.
We know that there are currently more than 1 000 inmates on death row in the Philippines. Of these, 165 death sentences have been affirmed by the Supreme Court and can be stopped only by a presidential stay of execution. We are calling again on the Philippine President to reprieve death-row convicts.
We are particularly concerned about the Supreme Court’s sentence of 3 February 2004 condemning the Spanish-Filipino citizen Francisco Larrañaga to death and the refusal to reconsider the case in July 2004, thus ending all judicial channels for appeal. On 5 July 2004, the EU Troika – consisting of the Netherlands, the UK and the Commission – handed an amicus curiae brief to the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs in support of the motion for the reconsideration of the case.
Since then, the Spanish Embassy in Manila has had the lead on that specific case, while the Commission is dealing with general issues related to the support of the campaign against the death penalty by various actors in the Philippines. The UK Embassy, in cooperation with the UK organisation Reprieve, has sent a lawyer to the Philippines for three months, starting in October 2005, to investigate the case.
We also support the various internal parliamentary initiatives on the revocation of the death penalty law that are currently being debated in the Philippines Congress, and we encourage the efforts by civil society to work towards that goal.
It is important to insist on the reconsideration of the Larrañaga case, as he has not had a fair trial according to international legal standards. So, even if Parliament ruled in favour of the abolition of the death penalty in exchange for life sentences, the Larrañaga case would remain flawed. The EU should continue to insist on the right to a fair trial for Mr Larrañaga."@en1
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