Proposal to abolish death penalty for 7 crimes

Agreeing on the viewpoint of limiting the death penalty, however, the Government's Proposal and the review report show that the proposal to abolish this penalty for 7 crimes still has conflicting opinions.

At the afternoon session on May 20, the National Assembly listened to Minister of Justice Ha Hung Cuong present the draft Penal Code (amended) on behalf of the Government. Minister Cuong said that the proposal to reduce the death penalty received absolute consensus from central and local agencies and organizations during the process of drafting the law.

Accordingly, the death penalty is only applied to certain subjects who commit certain types of particularly serious crimes; the scope of subjects not subject to the death penalty is expanded; cases where the death penalty is not carried out are expanded and the death penalty is converted into life imprisonment without parole to contribute to limiting the death penalty in practice...

Minister Ha Hung Cuong.

However, according to the Minister of Justice, there are still conflicting opinions on the proposed plans to abolish the death penalty for specific crimes. Specifically, the first type of opinion unanimously proposed to abolish the death penalty for 7 out of 22 crimes that have the death penalty in current law. These are the crimes of: robbery; destruction of important works and means of national security; disobeying orders; surrendering to the enemy; undermining peace, waging aggressive war; crimes against humanity, war crimes and illegal transportation of narcotics.

The second opinion is that in addition to the 7 crimes mentioned above, the death penalty should be abolished for 3 crimes: manufacturing and trading in counterfeit goods such as food, medicine, and disease prevention drugs; embezzlement of property; and bribery. Those who follow this opinion argue that these crimes are ultimately economic in nature, and that the perpetrators commit the crime in order to gain profit. In addition, there are opinions that the death penalty should not be abolished for the crime of destroying important works and means related to national security.

According to the head of the Ministry of Justice, with the above opinions, the Government sees that it is necessary to make uncompromising efforts to fight corruption. Many measures have been issued but have not been effective. Raising the issue of abolishing the death penalty for embezzlement and bribery - the two most typical and serious corruption crimes - is inappropriate, leading to the understanding that the law is lenient with corrupt officials...

Minister Ha Hung Cuong said that the draft law also adds provisions on applying life imprisonment without parole to cases where people sentenced to death are commuted to life imprisonment by the President to ensure that these people are kept alive, but are completely and permanently isolated from social life.

Presenting the review report on the draft law, Chairman of the Judiciary Committee Nguyen Van Hien said that the Committee agreed with the direction of continuing to limit the death penalty in all three aspects: reducing the number of crimes with the death penalty; regulating strict conditions to limit the cases of applying the death penalty and expanding the scope of subjects sentenced to death, but not having to carry out the death penalty, to clearly demonstrate the State's leniency and humanity.

Mr. Nguyen Van Hien said that there are still opinions on reducing the number of crimes punishable by death. The majority of the Committee's opinions agree to remove 7/22 crimes punishable by death, including: robbery; destruction of important works and means of national security; disobeying orders; surrendering to the enemy; undermining peace, waging aggressive war; crimes against humanity; war crimes.

However, there are also opinions that the death penalty should not be abolished for the crimes of: undermining peace, waging aggressive war, crimes against humanity, war crimes, because these are the most serious crimes among the especially serious crimes and in terms of political significance, as long as the death penalty is maintained, the death penalty should not be abolished for these crimes.

According to the meeting agenda, the draft Penal Code (amended) will be discussed in groups on May 28, discussed in the hall on June 16 and continue to be submitted to the National Assembly for consideration at the next meeting.

According to VNE