Van Tuong Nguyen

Van Tuong Nguyen (born August 17, 1980 in Songkhla , Thailand , † December 2, 2005 in Singapore ) was an Australian of Vietnamese descent who was sentenced to death for drug smuggling in Singapore and executed .

background

In December 2002 he was on his way back from Cambodia . At the Singapore Changi International Airport , the airport police found about 500 grams of narcotics in his hand luggage. With the proceeds of the drug sale, he said he wanted to pay off debts. He was then arrested. The run against him process resulted in the sentencing to death by train . From 15 grams of pure heroin , the death penalty is prescribed under Singapore's criminal law. The sentence was the morning local time on 2 December 2005, 6:00 enforced . Against the background of his visit to Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel also called on Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong to reconsider the death sentence. But Lee Hsien Loong said that death is the punishment and that the law must run its course.

Reactions

Australian Attorney General Philip Ruddock described the execution as "barbaric". Among other things, he criticized the fact that no mitigating circumstances had been taken into account. The then Australian Prime Minister John Howard criticized the "clinical regulation" in which the mother of the delinquent could only hold his hands instead of giving a hug.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Misuse of Drugs Act (Singapore)
2. ^ Australian executed in Singapore. bbc.com, December 2, 2005, accessed July 17, 2012 . 
3. ^ Rüdiger Falksohn, Jürgen Kremb: A man for the last few hours . In: Der Spiegel . No. 49 , 2005, pp. 141-142 ( online ).
4. ↑ Tricky visitors in the Chancellery. Spiegel Online , December 1, 2005, accessed July 17, 2012 . 
5. ↑ Singaporean Execution condemned. Worldpress.org, December 4, 2005, accessed July 17, 2012 . 
6. ↑ Singapore's executioner judges Australians at dawn. Die Welt , December 3, 2005, accessed July 17, 2012 .