During a debate on the death penalty at the UNCHR,...

During a debate on the death penalty at the UNCHR, Ambassador Z. Shaimergenova, permanent Kyrgyz Republic representative to the UN, informed the Commission's assembly that on March 23, 2004, Kyrgyz President Askar Akayev signed a law modifying his country's criminal Code by reducing the number of crimes warranting the death penalty. If in the country's 1997 criminal code there were six crimes warranting the death penalty, she said, they had now been reduced to three: aggravated murder; rape of underage children; genocide. Women and children were exempt from the death penalty in the country, she added.