By Thaddeus M. Baklinski
ROME, May 27, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Kokou Biossey Koné, Togo's Justice Minister, announced at the Fourth International Congress of Justice Ministers in Rome that Togo will soon be the latest African country to abolish the death penalty.
The congress, titled “From the Moratorium to the Abolition of Capital Punishment: No Justice Without Life,” was a meeting sponsored by the Community of Sant'Egidio in Rome of more than 35 ministers, government officials and policy advisers from 25 countries.
Togo established a moratorium on the death penalty 30 years ago, but only last year tabled a bill to abolish capital punishment. The legislation is set to pass this week.
However, in 2007, Togo gave in to pressure from the United Nations to expand its previously limited access to abortion with legislation that allows abortion in cases of rape or incest, or when the unborn child can be verified to have a “strong risk” of a “particularly serious medical condition.”
As in most African countries, abortion was previously illegal in Togo except when necessary to save the life of the mother.
Marco Impagliazzo, president of the Community of Sant'Egidio, said that Togo's abolition of the death penalty represents a “new moral level.”
Read related LSN coverage:
African Nation of Togo Succumbs to UN Pressure and Expands Abortion Access
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jan/07010207.html