Mexico's president to fight death penalty in Nigeria

Aug 28,2002

MEXICO CITY - After fighting the execution of a Mexican-American man in Texas, President Vicente Fox is taking his opposition of the death penalty to Nigeria, Mexico's foreign relations department said Wednesday.

 the death sentence of a 30-year-old woman accused of having a child out of wedlock, the foreign relations department said in a statement.

Amina Lawal's sentence sparked an international outcry by governments and human rights groups. Some Muslim groups have criticized the sentence for not complying with Islamic law.

Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo has the power to commute Lawal's sentence, but he has not announced plans to do so.

The case is not the first Fox has taken on personally.

The Mexican leader this month canceled a trip to Texas � where he was scheduled to meet with U.S. President George W. Bush, among others � after state officials ignored his pleas and executed a man Mexico claimed as its own. Texas officials said it was unclear whether Javier Suarez Medina was a Mexican citizen.

Since Suarez Medina's death, the Fox administration has focused on helping other Mexicans sentenced to death in the United States.

Nigeria is deeply divided about the application of Islamic law, or Shariah, which calls for such strict sentences as cutting off a hand to punish theft and death for adultery.

Lawal, 30, is the second woman to be condemned under Islamic law for having sex out of wedlock, but she is the first to lose an appeal. The man Lawal identified as her baby's father denied the accusation and was acquitted for lack of evidence.