Kazakhstan will declare a moratorium on capital punishment...

Kazakhstan will declare a moratorium on capital punishment as early as by the end of 2003, the speaker of the Senate, Oralbay Abdykarimov, said during a meeting with Baroness Vivien Stern, the honorary secretary-general Penal Reform International and a member of Britain's House of Lords.
Stern was on a visit to Kazakhstan and the meeting took place in the capital Astana.
Stern said that declaring a moratorium on capital punishment should become the political will of the president.
"There are other types of punishment, which are strict but more humane, and which are an alternative to the death penalty. I hope that Kazakhstan will join the countries where capital punishment has been abolished," Stern said.