09/04/02

Russia's Supreme Court chairman said Tuesday that the country should not revive the death penalty despite public support for its resumption.

Chairman Vyacheslav Lebedev was quoted by the ITAR-Tass and Interfax news agencies as saying that he agrees with President Vladimir Putin's recent statements against lifting the moratorium on the death penalty. The moratorium was imposed in 1996 to gain entrance into Europe's leading human rights body, the Council of Europe.

(Russia is a member of the Council of Europe. Therefore there cannot be any doubts on this issue,) Lebedev said.

He said the Russian judges' corps agreed.

Russia's lower house of parliament appealed to Putin earlier this year to

     resume executions because of soaring crime. Polls show that most Russians support the death penalty and believe it would act as a deterrent. But critics warn that reviving the death penalty would derail Russia's efforts to shed its repressive past.