{{On 10 July 2012, a Sudanese Judge Imad Shamoun sentenced Laila Ibrahim Issa Jamool, 23, to death by stoning for adultery at Al-Nasir Criminal Court under Article 146 of the Sudanese Penal Code 1991.}}<\/p>\n
Jamool is allegedly detained, shackled at the ankles with her six-month old baby at her side.<\/p>\n
Her child is reportedly in poor health and the distressed mother in need of psycho-social support.<\/p>\n
This is the second case of its kind this year. In April, Intisar Sharif Abdullah confessed to adultery after being beaten by her own brother and was sentenced to death by stoning. <\/p>\n
However, in both cases the women did not have access to a lawyer and were nursing children of breast feeding age, which is illegal under Sudanese and international law.<\/p>\n
Article 36(3) of the 2005 Interim Constitution of Sudan states: \u2018No death penalty shall be executed upon pregnant or lactating women, save after two years of lactation.\u2019<\/p>\n
Mrs. Abdullah was eventually released after an appeal with the retrial court finding a \u201clack of evidence\u201d against her.<\/p>\n
Responding to Jamool\u2019s sentence SIHA – the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa – issued a statement demanding her immediate and unconditional release and the end to the criminalisation of women for adultery in Sudan. <\/p>\n
The group asked the Ministry of Justice and other relevant institutions to investigate and overturn the judgment.<\/p>\n
SIHA\u2019s statement outlined that the case was “problematic” under both Sudanese and international law, calling on the “human rights community, The African Union, The Arab League, and United Nations and to oppose this practice and leverage its influence to prevent this act of brutality.”<\/p>\n
Under the United Nations Convention on Torture (1984) stoning is classed as cruel, inhuman and degrading. International human rights legislation that Sudan has signed prohibits stoning as a method of execution, according to SIHA\u2019s statement.<\/p>\n
Critically, the human rights group said, “this has been taking place in absence of legal representation for Jamool and after only three court sessions, inclusive of a referral to a higher court than that of first instance, Jamool was sentenced to death by stoning.”<\/p>\n
Sudan is one of the few countries which retains the death penalty for adultery. However, its application has not been recorded in recent years. <\/p>\n
Many of Sudan\u2019s Public Order Laws (based on the government\u2019s interpretation of Islamic Shari\u2019a Law) are inconsistently applied.<\/p>\n
President Omar al-Bashir said recently that Sudan\u2019s new constitution would be “100% Islamic” following the secession of the largely Christian South of the country last year.<\/p>\n
The legal procedures in Mrs. Jamool\u2019s case, SIHA said, are in clear violation of due process and Sudan\u2019s interim constitution:
\nArticle 34 (6) states that:<\/p>\n
\u201cany accused person has the right to defend himself\/herself in person or through a lawyer of his\/her own choice and to have legal aid assigned to him\/her by the State where he\/she is unable to defend himself\/herself in serious offences,\u201d<\/p>\n
SIHA also observe that Article 135 of Sudan\u2019s Criminal procedure code has been violated. <\/p>\n
This stipulates that defendants are entitled to legal representation in criminal cases carrying a sentence of 10 years or more, imprisonment, amputation or death.<\/p>\n
Jamool married her husband in 2008 but after 18 months she returned to her family and they have been estranged ever since. For over a year they have been going through divorce procedures.<\/p>\n
However, when she gave birth to a child six months ago her husband launched adultery charges – known as Zina in Islamic Shari\u2019a Law – against her and filed a case for her to be returned to his home.<\/p>\n
Jamool\u2019s husband has also asked her family to return some or all of the the dowry he paid them as part of traditional Sudanese wedding procedures four years ago.<\/p>\n
SIHA\u2019s Director, Hala Alkarib, said her organisation “condemns all forms of corporal punishment”, especially those involving the criminalisation of personal behaviour.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe victimization of women as the result of complex socio-economic and cultural relationships must be stopped and Sudan must urgently adopt measure and laws that protect and respect the dignity and the human rights of Sudanese women\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe criminalization of Sudanese women within the current legal framework subjects women to systematic and severe forms of violence and ultimately undermines their humanity and that of the society at large.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{{On 10 July 2012, a Sudanese Judge Imad Shamoun sentenced Laila Ibrahim Issa Jamool, 23, to death by stoning for adultery at Al-Nasir Criminal Court under Article 146 of the Sudanese Penal Code 1991.}} Jamool is allegedly detained, shackled at the ankles with her six-month old baby at her side. Her child is reportedly in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[75],"byline":[334],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-2795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-homenews","byline-igihe-reporter"],"bylines":[{"id":334,"name":"IGIHE Reporter","slug":"igihe-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":334,"name":"IGIHE Reporter","slug":"igihe-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2795\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2795"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=2795"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=2795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}