China's top judge urges caution on death penalty

BEIJING, Nov 9 (Reuters) China's courts must exercise ''extreme caution'' when handing out death penalties and judges should defer from sentencing execution if there is the least doubt, state media quoted the chief justice as saying.

''In cases where the judge has legal leeway to decide whether to order death, he should always choose not to do so,'' the official Xinhua news agency quoted top justice official Xiao Yang as saying.

If a convict gives themselves up, or helps solve a case, then judges should ''generally not pass'' a death sentence, he was quoted as saying in the late night report seen today.

Last month China, which executes more people than the rest of the world combined, said the Supreme Court would reclaim its right of final review of death sentences from January 1, ending the practice of allowing lower courts to order executions.

A bullet in the back of head -- a popular execution method in China -- should only be used on an ''extremely small number of serious offenders'', Xiao added.

''Judges should be very cautious, as if walking on thin ice, when it comes to the death penalty. They should ensure the facts and the evidence are all clear and the verdict is issued in accordance of law,'' said Xiao.

But he added there was little chance of abolishing the death penalty.

''The conditions are not yet ripe for China to ban the death penalty. It is still a necessary means to ensure the safety of the state and protect the people,'' Xiao said.

China executes an estimated 5,000-12,000 people a year, but has been slowly reforming its death penalty system after a series of high-profile wrongful convictions that raised public ire.

Chinese were outraged by the case of a butcher executed for murdering a waitress who was later found alive and that of a man who served 11 years for murdering his wife. She, too, turned up alive and with a new husband.

REUTERS DH BST0726