Mexico to Ask Court to Stop U.S. Executing Mexicans
BY ABIGAIL LEVENE
Reuters
AMSTERDAM - Mexico will Tuesday urge the World Court to order stays of execution and retrials for more than 50 Mexicans on death row in the United States.
The move reflects the deep disquiet among some of Washington's closest allies over capital punishment, which has led to protests from leading European states and Pope John Paul.
Mexico, which does not have the death penalty, says the United States violated the Mexicans' rights by failing to tell them they were entitled to consular assistance after arrest.
The 54 were condemned in 10 states including Illinois, where State Governor George Ryan this month took the unprecedented and widely lauded step of commuting the sentences of everyone on the state's death row, declaring the execution system "broken."
Three Mexicans were spared death by the Illinois decision, which came just days after Mexico brought its case to the International Court of Justice, or World Court, in The Hague.
A court spokeswoman said Mexico was free to amend details of its application in the light of the Illinois move.
Mexico has clashed repeatedly with the United States over the death penalty in connection with its nationals sentenced to death there.
Mexico's case in The Hague is that the United States violated international legal obligations in its treatment of the Mexicans who should therefore be retried.
The Vienna Convention on Consular Relations obliges local authorities to inform an arrested person without delay of his right to speak to consular officials of his country. Mexico says U.S. authorities breached this convention for the Mexicans.
"Mexico wants to request the U.S. to stay the executions, so that none of these 54 Mexicans is executed before the court comes to a final decision on whether the U.S. violated the Convention," said court spokeswoman Laurence Blairon.
LEGAL URGENCY
The United States and Japan are the only rich, industrial nations to execute convicted criminals: the last person executed in the European Union was guillotined in France in 1977. Pope John Paul has called for a worldwide ban on the death penalty, saying there were practically no cases where it was necessary.
The World Court usually takes years to reach final judgments, which are binding and cannot be appealed. Highlighting the case's urgency, Mexico has said a date may be set as soon as February 14 for one of the executions.
A similar case came before the court in 2001 when the United States was found to have breached the Convention in the case of two German-born brothers executed in Arizona in 1999.
Germany only learned of the situation of Karl and Walter LaGrand -- who stabbed to death a bank manager in a botched robbery -- when they were already on death row, 10 years after the crime and their arrests.
Walter was gassed to death in March 1999, the day after the World Court issued an emergency order to postpone the execution. Karl had been put to death before Germany filed the case.
Mexico recently clashed with the United States on the death penalty when Texas executed a Mexican citizen in August for the 1988 murder of an undercover Dallas police officer despite pleas for his life from the Mexican president.
Following that execution, Fox canceled a three-day trip to Texas in what his spokesman said was meant as "an unequivocal sign of our rejection of the execution."
