Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-03-11-Speech-4-213"
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"en.20100311.18.4-213"2
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"Mr President, the European Union in general, and this Parliament in particular, has a very proud record – an honourable tradition – of opposing the death penalty. Therefore we can do nothing other than regret the decision of the Republic of Korea’s Constitutional Court that the death penalty is not a violation of that country’s Constitution.
However, I believe we have to keep the issue in proportion. The justices ruled by a narrow margin of five votes to four. The last time they voted it was seven votes to two. They did not urge or condone the use of the death penalty but called for a political decision for the Korean Parliament to decide on the future abolition of the death penalty in that country.
We also have to note that South Korea is de facto an abolitionist country. No executions have been carried out since February 1998 and, in 2007, Amnesty International categorised South Korea as a country that has virtually abolished capital punishment.
However, the seriousness of this issue comes back to the fore when we realise that the floor leader of the Grand National Party in Korea said just recently that this de facto moratorium on capital punishment should be ended and a swift execution should take place of certain prisoners. I hope this unfortunate opportunistic voice in Korea will be ignored and that South Korea will indeed move away from being a de facto moratorium country by changing its law and becoming a de jure moratorium country."@en1
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The resource appears as object in 2 triples