Events in the Philippines and Death Penalty Thailand
The movement for abolition of the death penalty, as well illustrated in the Recent Congress in Oslo, is a worldwide issue. We advance and we fail together. This is especially true of the movement for abolition in South East Asia, ASEAN. There have been few advances in abolition in the region, and the threat of the Philippines to reinstate the death penalty has resonances in other ASEAN countries who are cool to human rights advances in ASEAN member states, but who derive comfort from regressive measures elsewhere which fortify their own dismal practices. It is in this perspective that the Death Penalty in any ASEAN state influences that of Thailand. We follow each others example and plead the cause of common practice according to shared Asian Values, which could and should have a positive connotation but is rather the notorious excuse for the worst of human practice rather than the better. As member citizens of ASEAN we have an interest and the right to observe and comment on practice in other ASEAN countries. We do not have to wait for unanimous consensus, nor do we neglect the right to comment on the internal practice of other members of the alliance, which mightily affect internal practice in our own country.