Pakistan is one of 12 countries in which apostasy or blasphemy are punishable by death, and continues to mete out more death sentences for blasphemy than any other country in the world. Despite having never carried out an execution on this basis, this hardline anti-blasphemy stance has engendered widespread violence at the community level, with countless accused blasphemers being killed by civilian vigilantes and mobs. To mark World Human Rights Day 2021, registrants are invited to join this high-level panel discussion on the situation in Pakistan, delivered by Eleos Justice in partnership with the Australian Government’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Delegation of the European Union to Australia.

In October this year, Project 39A published Deathworthy, a report presenting empirical data on mental illness and intellectual disability among death row prisoners in India and the psychological consequences of living on death row. In this seminar, Maitreyi Misra (Lead Author, Deathworthy) and Dr Danny Sullivan (forensic psychiatrist) join Mai Sato (Director, Eleos Justice) to discuss the implications of this ground breaking report.

In the final Conversation Series event for 2021, Dr Jeremy J Kingsley hosts Indonesian legal scholars Dr Rifqi S Assegaf and Anugerah Rizky Akbari in a discussion about the key features of the sentencing principles in Indonesia’s draft Criminal Code Bill. This seminar will highlight issues related to the draft Bill, including how the Bill’s multi-interpretable clauses and the wide judicial discretion offered within the draft legislation might lead to sentencing disparities, judicial abuse and bias. Our guests will examine the new types of punishment introduced in the Bill, as well as the new criteria on the application of the death penalty.

Observed annually on October 10, World Day Against the Death Penalty unifies and mobilises civil society, political leaders, lawyers, and public opinion in pursuit of universal abolition of the death penalty. Join us as we mark World Day 2021, and the first anniversary of Eleos Justice, with the launch of our new report: "Killing in the Name of God: State-Sanctioned Violations of Religious Freedom".

In 12 countries, offences such as apostasy and blasphemy are punishable by death. However, the death penalty is only the tip of the iceberg: extrajudicial executions and killings by non-state actors (such as civilians and extremist groups) carried out with impunity are illustrative of the myriad ways in which several of these States remain complicit in the killing of those deemed to have offended religion, whether by words, actions, or association. In "Killing in the Name of God: State-Sanctioned Violations of Religious Freedom", we examine the extent to which these 12 States sanction homicidal violence so as to stifle freedom of religion and expression, and consider how the global community may help shift this narrative. 

Following the report launch, we showcase the UN Digital Platform that we have been developing. We also unveil the annual World Day video, produced by students of our Eleos Anti-Death Penalty Clinic, in partnership with the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty and the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center.

Join us for a discussion of anti-death penalty advocacy in the Middle East North Africa Region with Jeed Basyouni (Head of Death Penalty, Middle East North Africa, Reprieve) and Sayed Ahmed Alwadaei (Director of Advocacy, Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy). In this seminar, we will explore learnings from anti-death penalty work in the MENA region, and how these might be applied in the Asia-Pacific region.

Professor Michael Hor, a leading academic on criminal law, criminal procedure, and evidence, joins us for a discussion of the death penalty in Singapore. We interrogate historical and contemporary trends in Singapore's death penalty practice, policy, and rhetoric, and look forward to contemplate the future of capital punishment in the city-state.

Professor William Schabas, an expert on international criminal and human rights law, joins us for a discussion of the role of international law in restricting and abolishing the death penalty, with a particular focus on the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).

In this instalment of our Conversation Series, Associate Professor Daniel Pascoe joins us for an examination of past and present death penalty politics in the South Pacific. This discussion will probe why Papua New Guinea and Tonga - the last retentionist states in the South Pacific - have strayed from the paths chartered by their geographical, cultural and historical neighbours.

Our inaugural conference, presented in partnership with Griffith University Centre for Social and Cultural Research, brought together academics and experts from around the world to discuss the politics of death penalty abolition from a number of perspectives—historical, legal and political, domestic and international. 

There are currently nearly 4,000 people on death row in Pakistan. In the third instalment of our Conversation Series, we discuss death penalty practice in Pakistan with Sarah Belal, Executive Director of Justice Project Pakistan.

Many take for granted the acceptability of consensual sexual activity between persons of the same sex, and the total inappropriateness of the state interfering with—let alone prohibiting—such behaviour. It may come as a surprise, then, that around the world, numerous states are complicit in the most extreme response to sexual diversity: homicide. 

In addition to those countries that impose the death penalty for same-sex intimacy, this report examines the far greater number of countries in which state actors commission, condone, endorse and enable the killing of sexual minorities. A global snapshot shows that sexual minorities have been subjected to extrajudicial executions and state-sponsored 'conversion therapies’ that lead to death or pose significant risk to life. Further, killings by private actors have been excused by discriminatory homicide laws, such as the notorious ‘gay panic’ defence which remained lawful in Australia until December 2020.

Join us for the launch of ‘State-Sanctioned Killing of Sexual Minorities: Looking Beyond the Death Penalty’, in partnership with Capital Punishment Justice Project.

Click here to watch this event.

In the second instalment of our Conversation Series, we hear from both speakers about various types of violence—direct, structural, and cultural—that occur in Sri Lankan prisons and beyond.

Ambika Satkunanathan speaks to us about the launch of a new report on Sri Lankan prisons published by the Human rights Commission of Sri Lanka. Despite a moratorium on executions which has been in place since 1976, judges have continued to sentence people to death. As of April 2018, over a thousand prisoners were on death row.

Catherine Heard shares her findings from her project ‘Understanding and reducing the use of imprisonment in ten countries’, which examines the realities of imprisonment across five continents (See ICPR’s latest report here.)

Click here to watch this event.

In Conversation with Dr Christopher Ward SC

Join us for the first instalment of the Conversation Series, delivered by Eleos Justice and Capital Punishment Justice Project.