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their death sentences commuted to imprisonment. In the People's Republic of China, however, the death sentence is widely imposed and often carried out.
Amnesty International opposes the death penalty as not only a violation of the right to life, but also the ultimate form of cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. There is no conclusive evidence that the death penalty is a deterrent against crime. In practice, the death penalty is an arbitrary punishment. It is irrevocable and always carries the risk that the innocent may be put to death. For these reasons Amnesty International works for the abolition of the death penalty in all circumstances.
Accordingly, Amnesty International recommends that the Bill of Rights expressly abolish the death penalty. If this humanitarian step cannot be taken, at least the Bill of Rights should include an explicit assurance that Hong Kong's current policy of not carrying out death sentences will continue after July 1997.
Article 6 of the Covenant, which the Bill of Rights adopts in its Article 2, also anticipates the progressive abolition of the death penalty. For example, Article 6(6) indicates that nothing in that article "shall be invoked to delay or to prevent the abolition of capital punishment". view of the current de facto abolition of the death penalty in Hong Kong, it would be contrary to the thrust of Article 6 for the application of the death penalty to be revived in Hong Kong after 1997.
In Part I, Clause 2(5), the Draft Bill of Rights includes a provision from Article 5 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that establishes that it is not the exclusive protection of human rights in the HKSAR: "There shall be no restriction upon or derogation from any of the fundamental human rights recognized or existing in Hong Kong pursuant to law, conventions, regulations or custom on the pretext that the Bill of Rights does not recognize such rights or that it recognizes them to a lesser extent" (emphasis added). The word "custom" should include the de facto abolition of the death penalty in Hong Kong.
9.2 Reservations
The Reservations section in Part III, Clause 9, limits the Bill of Rights as it applies to prisoners, who are "subject to such restrictions as may from time to time be authorized by law for the preservation of service and custodial discipline". When the United Kingdom ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, it included this reservation. The reservation allows deviation from the Bill of Rights in the cases of prisoners incarcerated in penal institutions. Another reservation in Clause 10 allows deviation from a specific provision in the Bill of Rights that requires juvenile prisoners to be maintained separately from adults. Amnesty International is very concerned that these reservations would incorporate into the Bill of Rights provisions which are contrary to internationally-recognized human rights standards. Other countries have not found it necessary to make such reservations to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Moreover, these reservations could be used to restrict other fundamental human rights -- for example they could provide a context in which torture or ill-treatment would be more likely to occur. The reservation allowing juvenile prisoners to be