Sir Richard Branson has rejected an invite to look in a stay tv debate on the loss of life penalty in Singapore.
Branson stated the dialogue “cannot do the complexity of the death penalty any service” and known as on Singapore to embrace a “constructive, lasting dialogue involving multiple stakeholders”.
The 72-year-old – a vocal campaigner towards capital punishment – was invited by Singapore’s Home Affairs Ministry for a debate which might additionally cowl the nation’s strategy to medicine.
The British entrepreneur stated he has “enormous respect” for the nation and it was due to this that he feels “compelled to speak out” when he sees issues “go horribly wrong as Singapore’s use of the death penalty”.
He was considered one of many international critics to talk out over the controversial case of a Malaysian man with studying difficulties who was executed for drug trafficking.
In a weblog publish about his determination to show down the TV debate, Branson stated: “I have decided to decline this invitation. Here is why: a television debate – limited in time and scope, always at risk of prioritising personalities over issues – cannot do the complexity of the death penalty any service.
“It reduces nuanced discourse to soundbites, turns severe debate into spectacle. I can not think about that’s what you might be searching for.
“What Singapore really needs is a constructive, lasting dialogue involving multiple stakeholders, and a true commitment to transparency and evidence.”
He stated the “conversation needs local voices” and he was a “global advocate for abolition of the death penalty” and would “continue to raise the issue wherever I can, as I have for many years”.
In his publish, he shared a private story about his grandfather who was a barrister after which a High Court decide whose “greatest regret in life was donning the black cap and sentencing people to death”.
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“And he told my father he not only disagreed with the principle of the state killing people,” he wrote, “he was also genuinely concerned that in the process, innocent people had been and would be executed. History has proven him right, time and again.”
Branson added that imposing the loss of life penalty for medicine offences was a “disproportionate and ineffective response to the world’s drug problems”.
Source: information.sky.com”