A report issued Thursday by UK-based group The Death Penalty Project has criticized Taiwan’s use of the death penalty.
According to the report, the process through which the death penalty is carried out in Taiwan has several flaws that contravene the rules set out in two conventions Taiwan signed in 2009.
According to the report, the accused in death penalty cases are not given a psychological evaluation, are not given access to a defense lawyer throughout the entire trial, and are sometimes executed before the court has responded to a request for clemency. The report concluded that abolishing the death penalty would be the wisest policy.
The Death Penalty Project’s executive director Saul Lehrfreund said that the conventions Taiwan signed in 2009 do not mandate the abolition of the death penalty. However he said that signatories are expected to use the death penalty less frequently and institute reforms, neither of which Taiwan has done.