Death Penalty in United Arab Emirates

Open Executions are rare in the UAE. Since 1997, nine people  including a woman, are known to have been executed in the UAE.  All had been convicted of murder. A number of people have been  sentenced to death for drug offences. However, no one is known  to have been executed on drug charges. Executions are usually by firing-squad" The execution which  enforces Islamic sharia law is being carried out by a firing squad. Death sentences may be appealed to the ruler of the emirate  in which the offense is committed, or to the president of the  federation, although in the case of murder, only the victim's  family may commute a death sentence. The government normally  negotiates with victims' families for the defendant to  offer financial compensation, or diya, to the victims' families  to receive their forgiveness and commute death sentences.                    Death Penalty by firing squad United Arab Emirates member state Dubai has executed  a Pakistani man, Attaullah Khair Mohammed by firing squad  for murdering an Indian watchman. The official Emirates  News quoted family sources as saying that Mohammed  was put to death on Monday (June 01, 1998) morning  at a local shooting range. A number of officials from the  public prosecutor's office watched the execution. The United Arab Emirates court of appeals in Al-Fujeira  convicted an Iranian to death after he was found guilty  of smuggling drugs. "The Gulf" daily published this (UAE to  execute Iranian trader: United Arab Emirates, Judicial,  6/19/1998) in Dubai said the court sentenced one  Iranian to 10 years imprisonment for smuggling drugs and  another four Iranian as drug users. However, the sentence  was resumed on the grounds of the law approved in 1995  providing for death penalty over drug smuggling. Between  1996-1998 eight persons have been executed in the UAE  according to this law. Death Penalty by stoning The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has sentenced foreign  nationals to death by stoning for adultery. In February 2000, a Shari'a (Islamic) court in the Emirate  ordered an Indonesian domestic worker Kartini bint Karim, to  be stoned to death, reportedly after she confessed to  adultery. During her appeal, however, she reportedly denied  that she had confessed to adultery and her lawyer is said to  have argued that this would not have been possible as she  does not speak Arabic. Later, an appeal court in the Emirate of Fujairah, where  she had been working legally, fortunately overturned  the death sentence against Kartini bint Karim to one  year's imprisonment, with an order that she be deported  at the end of her sentence.

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