KIEV, SEPT 30: Ukrainian courts have sentenced 81 people to death so far this year, but none of the sentences have been carried out, the Itar-Tass news agency has reported.Two of those sentenced to death are women, Itar-Tass said yesterday, citing Ukraine's supreme court. Ukraine pledged to halt capital punishment when it joined the Council of Europe, the continent's leading human rights organization, in 1995. However, 180 people were killed before the former Soviet republic started to comply with the moratorium in March 1997.
Ukraine's legislature recently gave preliminary approval to a new criminal code that permits use of the death penalty only during martial law.
Amnesty International, the London-based human rights group, said Ukraine was second only to China in the use of capital punishment in 1996.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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