With per capita gross domestic product the highest in Asia at US$62,400 by purchasing power parity, Singapore ranks as the world’s seventh-richest country. It remains an anomaly, the most modern city in Southeast Asia, but it still canes offenders, ruins its political enemies and uses the courts to silence its enemies either through defamation suits or contempt of court.
A new report by Amnesty International illustrates the country’s contradictions and without saying so, hints that change could be on its way. Amnesty International’s Southeast Asia representative, Margaret John, noted in transmitting the report that since it was written, “recent weeks have seen questions raised as to the Singapore of the future” due to the uncertain health of the country’s founder, Lee Kuan Yew, and his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who was recently diagnosed with prostate cancer. The elder Lee has been hospitalized with pneumonia. He remains in intensive care although the latest reports indicate his health has improved slightly.
Lee Hsien Loong, aged 63, was initially diagnosed with lymphoma in the early 1990s. He underwent a prostatectomy on Feb. 15. It was announced that the operation was a success.
If anything, despite its prosperity and modernity, Singapore has slipped back a notch in the past year. Amnesty International noted that the island republic had reinstituted the death penalty, hanging two drug offenders after a three-year moratorium on executions. The execution of one offender was stayed in March 2014, but commutations to life imprisonment involve 15 strokes of the cane. In 2012, the last year for which statistics are available, judges sentenced 2,500 offenders to be caned. Of those, 88 percent were carried out. According to Singapore’s Criminal Procedure Code, the offender strips naked and is bent over a padded crossbar. His other hands and feet are secured with leather strips. The caning officer delivers the number of strokes prescribed at a rate of one every 10 to 15 seconds. In cases where the offender is hurt so badly that he can’t undergo the rest of the punishment, he is sent back to the court for the remaining number of strokes to be prescribed or converted to a prison term of no more than 12 months. Full story...
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A new report by Amnesty International illustrates the country’s contradictions and without saying so, hints that change could be on its way. Amnesty International’s Southeast Asia representative, Margaret John, noted in transmitting the report that since it was written, “recent weeks have seen questions raised as to the Singapore of the future” due to the uncertain health of the country’s founder, Lee Kuan Yew, and his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who was recently diagnosed with prostate cancer. The elder Lee has been hospitalized with pneumonia. He remains in intensive care although the latest reports indicate his health has improved slightly.
Lee Hsien Loong, aged 63, was initially diagnosed with lymphoma in the early 1990s. He underwent a prostatectomy on Feb. 15. It was announced that the operation was a success.
If anything, despite its prosperity and modernity, Singapore has slipped back a notch in the past year. Amnesty International noted that the island republic had reinstituted the death penalty, hanging two drug offenders after a three-year moratorium on executions. The execution of one offender was stayed in March 2014, but commutations to life imprisonment involve 15 strokes of the cane. In 2012, the last year for which statistics are available, judges sentenced 2,500 offenders to be caned. Of those, 88 percent were carried out. According to Singapore’s Criminal Procedure Code, the offender strips naked and is bent over a padded crossbar. His other hands and feet are secured with leather strips. The caning officer delivers the number of strokes prescribed at a rate of one every 10 to 15 seconds. In cases where the offender is hurt so badly that he can’t undergo the rest of the punishment, he is sent back to the court for the remaining number of strokes to be prescribed or converted to a prison term of no more than 12 months. Full story...
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