CHILE ABOLISHES THE DEATH PENALTY

the Chilean Lower House voted the proposal to abolish the death penalty with a majority of 65 votes in favour and 37 against. Three deputies abstained. The Senate had previously voted the bill with 29 votes in favour and 15 against.Justice Minister Jose Antonio Gomez said: "This is a historic day, because we have reached something that was unthinkable just a few years ago. We have removed from our codes an irrational and inhuman law."When the bill is ratified the death penalty will be removed from the penal code. It will remain applicable only by military tribunals in times of war. The maximum punishment in Chile will be 40 years without the possibility of parole. The only exceptions will concern prisoners who are seriously or terminally ill or reasons of state.Chilean MPs still have to agree on whether it should be the Supreme Court’s responsibility to decide if prisoners with life-terms should be released after serving 40 years or not. The Chilean government favours empowering the Supreme Court in plenary session to take such a decision. The proposal is now back at the Senate to debate this point.The approval of the bill was welcomed by the Roman Catholic Church, which lobbied extensively for abolition through Cardinal Francisco Javier Errázuriz (photo).“The important thing is to help people rehabilitate themselves and take the path that will allow them to live as humans. I hope Chile will continue along this path: respecting the life about to be born and the life of every human being,” Errázuriz said. However the Support Group for the Families of Raped and Murdered Children, lambasted the abolitionist legislation. “We feel absolutely deceived by the legislative power, which lacked the guts to make laws that are beneficial to the people,” group president Jacqueline van Rysselberghe said. All death row inmates will have their sentences automatically commuted to life sentences, though in fact the death penalty hasn’t been applied since 1985. Chile has executed 57 persons in the 112 years it retained the death penalty.