EU under fire at U.N. death penalty debate

By Claudia Parsons

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - A bid to have the U.N. General Assembly call for a moratorium on the death penalty drew charges on Wednesday that the European Union was trying to impose its values on others in a throwback to colonialism.

Eighty-seven countries, including EU member states as well as more than a dozen Latin American states and eight African countries, jointly introduced a draft resolution calling for a moratorium with a view to abolishing capital punishment.

The representative for Singapore, which has been criticized by human rights groups for implementing a mandatory death penalty for most drug offenses, warned that the move would "poison the atmosphere between us."

"We are about to embark on a divisive, unpleasant and unnecessary fight," Singapore's Kevin Cheok told the General Assembly's human rights committee,

Two similar moves in the 1990s failed in the 192-member assembly, whose resolutions are non-binding but carry moral authority. This time, the text of the resolution stops short of an outright demand for immediate abolition.

Instead, the draft calls for "a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death penalty."

It says the punishment "undermines human dignity," that "there is no conclusive evidence of the death penalty's deterrent value" and "any miscarriage or failure of justice in (its) implementation is irreversible and irreparable."

Opponents of the move, ranging from Botswana to Barbados, Iran, China and Egypt, said more than 100 countries retain the death penalty on the books and argued it was a criminal justice issue clearly within the bounds of national jurisdiction.