Latest: Singapore single mother awaits death row in Malaysia for drug trafficking. On the pretext of a business trip to China, Iqah was handed a suitcase containing heroin arranged by her Nigerian boyfriend and was arrested by Malaysian Immigration. A campaign is underway to raise funds for the appeal. To find out more, read

We have also heard that since Vui Kong's appeal started, there has been an unofficial stay of execution for all prisoners on death row in Changi Prison, pending the decision of the court on Yong's case. As the case has been dismissed by the Court of Appeal, we anticipate a Changi gallows bloodbath in a scale not seen since the Pulau Senang uprising in 1965 when 18 men were convicted of murder and hanged in a single Friday morning.

Singapore, which routinely persecute dissenters and critics, continue to hang young drug runners while at the same time work closely with Burmese military generals, and has invested billions in business ties with Burma, one of the biggest heroin manufacturing countries the world.

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If you know someone who's charged in a capital case, received the death sentence, or is on death row in Singapore and if you have have your side of the story to tell, contact us at sgdeathpenalty [at] gmail.com

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Malaysian senators plead for Sabah youth’s life

Free Malaysia Today: Malaysian senators plead for Sabah youth’s life 

Wed, 21 Jul 2010 15:39
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By Patrick Lee

KUALA LUMPUR: Several senators and NGOs today urged Singapore authorities to spare the life of Yong Vui Kong, a Sabahan youth convicted of drug trafficking.
The senators and NGO representatives gathered in the Parliament lobby today to demonstrate their support for Yong’s clemency petition to the Singapore president.

Yong, 18, was sentenced to death in January last year for trafficking in 47 grammes of diamorphine, a derivative of heroin. He was to have been executed last December, but he filed an appeal against the sentence on the ground that the death penalty was inhumane. The appeal was rejected last May.

The senators are concerned that the Singapore government had apparently already decided to reject his plea for a pardon even before it is filed.

Yong’s lawyer, M Ravi, who recently brought Yong’s plight to the attention of MPs and senators, said Singapore’s law minister K Shanmugam had prejudiced his client’s appeal for clemency with his statement that Singapore would be giving the wrong signal to potential drug traffickers if Yong was spared.

“Yong Vui Kong is young,” Ravi quoted Shanmugam as saying. “But if we say, 'We let you go,' what is the signal we are sending?”

Tunku Aziz condemned the statement. "It should not be about sending the right message,” he said.

Petaling Jaya municipal councillor Richard Yeoh, who was also in the Parliament gathering, said Yong deserved a second chance. He said the young man was “a victim of the syndicates” and was acting as a drug mule.

It emerged during the trial that Yong is the product of a broken home who began his life in crime at the age of 15. He sold pirated VCDs and then got involved with secret societies.

Early this month, Foreign Minister Anifah Aman said his ministry would write to the Singapore government to plead for clemency on Yong’s behalf.

"In the past 12 years, not a single case carrying the death penalty has been awarded a pardon," Yeoh said. "What does this say about them?”

"We are not saying that there has been a miscarriage of justice," said Tunku Aziz. "However, in the appeal for clemency, all circumstances should be considered."

Also read:

Singapore: M'sia yet to plead clemency for drug mule

Local man in Singapore death row gets govt support
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