Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has called again for...

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has called again for the death penalty to be banned in his country but has stressed the decision should not result from pressure from abroad.
"Cancelling the death penalty should not be the result of economic, political or security pressures like the ones piled on Turkey to win a European Union membership," Gaddafi said.
Such a decision "is linked to progress ... in society. It is one of the fruits of a civilised mind", he said in a speech to a gathering of judges, lawyers, law university teachers and students on November 1.
Gaddafi said he had made similar pleas to the top executive and legislative body, but it had so far refused to accept them.
"I had decided to cancel that penalty but the People's Congress did not accept it because they are not convinced and also because society has yet to reach a stage of ... civilisation to ban the death penalty," he said.