Russia's top judge opposes the death penalty

MOSCOW, Mar 10 (Reuters) Russia's top judge said today capital punishment was ''unacceptable'', wading into a debate sparked by prosecutors demanding death for the only survivor of the group that seized 1,300 hostages in Beslan in 2004.

Russia imposed a moratorium on the death penalty in 1996, but it remains on the statute books and judges can theoretically impose it for crimes involving murder. It is then automatically changed into life imprisonment.

''I think it is unacceptable that criminal courts should decide to impose the death penalty just so later a higher court should cancel this decision,'' Vyacheslav Lebedev, chairman of the Supreme Court, was quoted by Interfax news agency as saying.

''We do not have the right to impose the death penalty today.'' Nurpashi Kulayev, who was captured after the hostage siege in Beslan collapsed into a bloodbath in which 330 hostages and all the other rebels died, has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder and terrorism.

The judge in the court is currently considering the verdict.

Russia's Constitutional Court has previously ruled that only jury courts have the right to impose the death sentence.

Jury courts are being rolled out across Russia, although most courts including the one in the town of Vladikavkaz where Kulayev is being tried still consist of three judges.

REUTERS SY KN1922