Justifying Nuclear Power Plants Through Executions

It is understood that newly appointed Minister of Justice Lo Ying-sheng intends to carry out executions again, citing persistently high public opinion in favor of the death penalty. This is generally believed to be related to shifting the focus from the currently surging public sentiment against nuclear power.

The mindset of this government is truly incomprehensible and utterly absurd. Public sentiment against nuclear power remains high, yet the government ignores it completely; however, public sentiment in favor of the death penalty is also high, and the government is more than happy to carry it out? One must remember that both "building a nuclear power plant" and "carrying out the death penalty" involve the people's right to life, and share the common characteristic of irreversibility.

Once the fuel rods of Nuclear Power Plant No. 4 are inserted and operation begins, Taiwan will reach a point of no return. That is not something President Ma can simply dismantle just because he says so. Even with 100% nuclear safety, it cannot withstand a single devastating earthquake or tsunami, and the resulting casualties and disasters will be difficult to heal even over a millennia. The same goes for the death penalty. Once a national judicial system misjudges a case, carrying out the death penalty means the state has wrongfully killed an innocent person, and life can never be recovered. What good is paying hundreds of millions in compensation to the family? The tears of Chiang Kuo-ch'ing's mother—who waited in vain for her son to return safely—have said it all. Several recent cases successfully granted retrials and acquittals further tell us the limits and flaws where judicial power sometimes falls short.

The judicial system can never be perfect, just as there can never be a nuclear power plant in this world capable of withstanding any disaster. Therefore, what the government must do is reject such systems and facilities that, once triggered, are irreversible. Why? Because these all involve the people's most supreme and priceless right to life, and inherently cannot be resolved through a referendum.

Ever since Minister Lo took office, we have been anxious and uneasy, not knowing when she might decide to kill. Perhaps she was overwhelmed by the criminal case and the departure of the Prosecutor-General; perhaps she has been busy lately refuting civil disobedience, stubbornly insisting on using criminal penalties to punish students; or perhaps it is because she appointed a Deputy Minister, Ts'ai Pi-yü, who is known as being anti-death penalty. Having been in office for over half a year, even through the political turbulence of the Sunflower Student Movement, we still did not see any intention from the Ministry of Justice to carry out executions to divert attention, which was gratifying and commendable. Yet now, facing the high public sentiment against nuclear power that is similarly tied to the people's right to life, the Ministry of Justice is actually acting in reverse, using executions to demonstrate the legitimacy of building a killing machine like a nuclear power plant?

The Two Covenants Hold the Same Legal Status

Putting everything else aside for a moment, a recent and latest Supreme Court judgment cited the report issued last October by ten international independent experts who reviewed our country's implementation of the Two Covenants. The report demanded that until the complete abolition of the death penalty, our country must not sentence individuals with psychological or intellectual disabilities to death nor execute them, criticizing lower courts for sentencing defendants with obvious mental disabilities to death as an illegal judgment. In other words, since the Supreme Court considers the "Concluding Observations and Recommendations" from the international expert review to be on par with the legal status of the Two Covenants, it cannot ignore Conclusion No. 56, which recommends that the primary decisive step for the Taiwan government should be to "immediately comply with relevant United Nations General Assembly resolutions to suspend executions." Furthermore, the latter part of Conclusion No. 57 emphasizes that under Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) among the Two Covenants, those sentenced to death have the right to seek amnesty or commutation of sentence. The 15 death penalty cases executed by Taiwan over the past three years (to which 6 more were later added) all violated this article of the Covenant.

Even if Minister Lo is unfamiliar with matters concerning the Two Covenants, she should at least be able to understand the reminders in the Supreme Court judgment. As for Deputy Minister Ts'ai Pi-yü, Minister Lo's most trusted right-hand person, being a human rights advocate opposed to the death penalty, she should exert every effort to earnestly urge Minister Lo to suspend executions in accordance with the law (the Two Covenants), or at least complete the procedures required by the Two Covenants—such as examining the mental capacity of death row inmates and determining whether the President will grant amnesty or commutation—before proceeding further. This is the proper demeanor expected of a political appointee. One cannot simply cast aside their beliefs regarding the right to life with a casual remark like that of National Security Bureau Director-General Ts'ai Te-sheng, who said, "I don't have that many a sense of mission" or "I strictly keep to my own duties!" Of course, Minister Lo, who describes herself as a devout Buddhist, might also consider whether practicing the Buddhist teaching of non-killing is a faith that better exemplifies a human rights mission.