https://www.wethecitizens.net/wtc-wrap-16-may-2026
Singapore carried out its 10th execution of 2026 yesterday morning. It’s a staggering pace of killing.
On Tuesday, during Singapore’s Universal Periodic Review at the UN Human Rights Council, a total of 41 countries made recommendations related to the death penalty, such as urging for a moratorium on executions and respecting the right to life. In its press statement on the session, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reduced this high number of recommendations (even more than the death penalty recommendations made during the last cycle) to a quick and vague reference to “recommendations by several States on the abolition of capital punishment”.
Singapore’s delegation, led by Minister of State for Health and Digital Development and Information Rahayu Mahzam, insisted that our criminal punishment policies are evidence-based and in line with international law—even though international standards make it clear that “[in] countries which have not abolished the death penalty, capital punishment may be imposed only for the most serious crimes, it being understood that their scope should not go beyond intentional crimes with lethal or other extremely grave consequences”. If you’re interested, I found a 2013 paper that begins with discussion of this “most serious crimes” limitation and makes clear that the mandatory death penalty for drug offences—which is what Singapore has—does not meet this standard.
“The use of capital punishment in our criminal justice system is not a decision we have taken lightly, and we do so with a heavy heart,” Rahayu told the Human Rights Council. I’m glad I’d already gone to bed by this point and didn’t see her say this live, or I might still be crawling on my hands and knees, swearing, trying to locate the eyeballs that rolled out of my head. Hanging 10 people in under five months, taking the position that people can be executed despite being party to ongoing legal proceedings or formal complaints against their previous lawyers, and reviewing policy to reduce notice periods for some prisoners is not “heavy heart” behaviour.
MARUAH Singapore 