The death penalty is indicative of the government's...

The death penalty is indicative of the government's failure to face social problems, said Father Louis Khawand, president of the Religious Education Center in the Maronite monastery of Mashmoushe, Jezzine, in an interview with Beirut's The Daily Star. "The purpose behind any fair, good, and beneficial law must be the reformation of society," he said, adding that the role of the government was to deter evil and not kill criminals. The leading Shiite cleric said Lebanon was still in a tribal state of its development and consequently needed the penalty to avoid vengeance killings. He called on the government to replace the death penalty with the International Declaration of Human Rights.