AUSTRALIA:
Death penalty stance comes back to haunt Government

The attacks in Jakarta's two safest luxury hotels on the Muslim sabbath, allegedly by the al-Qaeda-linked terrorist group Jemaah Islamiah ("Sanctuaries no longer impregnable", July 18-19), will no doubt send a clear message to Western nations such as Australia that they are firmly being held in the line of fire by radicalised Islamic militants.
But while the attacks were typically denounced by the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, as cowardly and barbaric, they are nevertheless part of a much larger picture that the Government cannot rule out with absolute impunity.
According to security analyst Dr Carl Ungerer and his Indonesian counterpart, Noor Huda Ismail, the execution of the 3 Bali bombing perpetrators in November of last year may have prompted the further radicalisation of some hardline JI offshoots. They even go as far as to suggest that these groups could perceive the executions as a sacred date to be leveraged to attract new support and recruits.
Given the pivotal nature of their observations, it would not be too difficult to conclude that the former Howard government's unprincipled stand on the death penalty, which received bipartisan support, has now come back to haunt the Rudd Government with a vengeance.
Mr Rudd would certainly be very loath to admit that there was any possible link between the 2. But if the Government is to make any headway in its response to these latest blasts, it must do all in its moral power to give our enemies far less cause to take the lives of innocent civilians. (source: Sydney Morning Herald

Death Penalty and Execution News

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