Akmal Shaikh

Drug trafficking, trials and execution Reprieve said Shaikh met a man in Poland named "Carlos" sometime in 2007 who he believed had contacts in the music industry and could help make him famous; On 12 September 2007, Shaikh flew from Dushanbe in Tajikistan, to Ürümqi in north-west China. Shaikh claimed he was told he would have to travel alone to China as the flight was full; "Okole" allegedly gave him a suitcase to carry, and promised he would take the next flight. Alerted by Shaikh's nervous and circumspect behaviour, customs officers searched and found the drugs hidden in a compartment of his case, which was "practically empty" but for a few clothes; he only had US$100 and 100 Chinese yuan on his person.

First trial – November 2007 Chen Dong, Director of the Ürümqi Legal Aid Center, was appointed to represent Shaikh, who was tried in November 2007. Defence asserted to the court that Shaikh knew nothing of the drugs, and that he did not knowingly smuggle the narcotics. According to the Sanlian Living Weekly article, one of the two lawyers representing Shaikh during his second trial, Mr. Cao Hong, said that the key defence argument was Shaikh's ignorance of the drug he was transporting. Cao said the official documents, baggage examination reports from the record of his arrest, as well as pictures and video footage taken during the baggage check was "overwhelmingly against Shaikh"; he did not play in court some of the video footage recorded because it was too incriminating. His lawyer, Cao, confirmed that the documents he received from Reprieve contained "medical information about bipolar disorder, and a list of symptoms and case studies" not specific to Shaikh. Xinhua stated that the court's decision to refuse a mental assessment was based on PRC laws requiring defendants to first provide past medical records showing evidence of a mental disorder before such evaluations could be undertaken. Xinhua also reported the Supreme People's Court's view that medical records provided by the British Embassy contained no documentary evidence to support claims of Shaikh's condition. Although the Chinese authorities state he was provided with interpretation during his trials, and the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, too intimated that interpretation may have been inadequate. and his execution date was set for 29 December. Shaikh was not told of his impending execution throughout this time "for humanitarian reasons". Shaikh was visited by two cousins and British consular officials in the hospital where he had been treated for a heart condition since August 2009,

Execution – December 2009 Shaikh was executed by lethal injection at 10:30 CST (02:30 GMT) on 29 December 2009 at the Xishan Detention Centre in Ürümqi. Family members and British consular officials were refused access to Shaikh during the final hours by the Chinese authorities, and were not allowed to witness the execution. They did not dispute that he was carrying a large amount of heroin, and UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, Philip Alston, who said there were "strong indications" that Shaikh may have had a mental illness. and that "xecuting a mentally ill man would be a major step backwards for China."

His family, which had lost touch with him when he left for Poland, also pleaded for mercy: in a letter to the Chinese Ambassador, his elder brother Akbar wrote that his brother's life had been destroyed by mental illness; Akbar maintained that Shaikh was kind and harmless when healthy, and was much loved by his family. He was concerned at the effect his execution would have on their mother: "She is a frail woman, and our family have not been able to break the news to her that she may lose her youngest child next week."

Reprieve and his family all cite examples of Shaikh's "erratic behaviour" and "questionable decisions" at least since 2001. Reprieve interviewed people who had dealings with him to support their claims that he may have had bipolar disorder. However, through 15 minutes' access given to Foreign Office officials to interview Shaikh, Dr Schaapveld said he was able to deduce "with 99 per cent certainty" that Shaikh had a mental disorder, possibly bipolar or schizophrenia. In an op-ed in the South China Morning Post, Professor Jerome A. Cohen suggested that China had failed to comply with its own and international legal standards that required a thorough mental evaluation of Shaikh before rendering a final judgment. It added that "the court had no reason not to consider the plaintiff's alleged mental illness if he showed any signs of suffering from it while he was in jail." It further asserted that the claims of his family were contradicted by Shaikh himself, Wang Mingliang, professor of criminal law in Fudan University, and professor Xue Jinzhan, professor of criminal law at the East China University of Political Science and Law, stated that "the Chinese court's decision to execute Akmal Shaikh was completely appropriate ... [and] the denial of mental evaluation was legitimate and consistent with legal precedent". Xue Jinzhan said the administration of the death penalty related to a country's history, culture and other conditions: "It's human nature to plead for a criminal who is from the same country or the same family, but judicial independence should be fully respected and everyone should be equal before the law";

When his cousins, Soohail and Nasir Shaikh, arrived in Ürümqi to spend time with him at the hospital in Ürümqi the day before the execution, they also made a last-minute petition to the local court for a stay of execution; they and British embassy officials delivered a plea for mercy to president Hu Jintao. It was during this visit that Akmal was informed of his impending death.

Reprieve, the group which mounted his campaign, said they had passed on new evidence and testimonials from six people who knew Akmal in Poland that they had received in the final 24 hours which the Chinese government had not acknowledged receiving at the time of the execution. Sally Rowan, their legal director, said that any talk of 'special treatment' was "ridiculous"– as Chinese law has provisions to protect those with mental illness, but they chose not to invoke them. Rowan condemned the execution of an incompetent man as "barbaric". Other mental health charities echoed the sentiments.

Shaikh's family was saddened by the execution, but was split as to whether the UK establishment had done all it could to secure humanitarian treatment. Shaikh's cousins Soohail and Nasir Shaikh praised the efforts of Gordon Brown, British ministers and Reprieve. Two other cousins, Amina and Ridwan Shaikh, attacked the government and the media in a scathing letter to The Guardian that questioned the effectiveness of the government's approach. They criticised the "sporadic media attention" about their cousin's plight for two years, and accused the government of acting out its powerlessness in the face of China's economic might.

United Kingdom Following the execution, there was a range of views in the British press, some agreed with the political leaders Gordon Brown, David Miliband and David Cameron, who expressed concerns that a mental health assessment was not done, and that clemency requests had not been granted; others were critical of the UK government's reaction; and some were fairly neutral. Among the journalists who supported the UK government's stance were Dominic Ziegler, author of The Economist Banyan column on Asian affairs, who felt that the issue raised questions about effective use of protections for defendants during judicial process; – Prospect magazine held a similar opinion that the Chinese authorities wished to "stand up to its old oppressors" and show the Chinese people that they [the nation] were "being led in the right direction [by the unelected Communist Party in a time of economic crisis]".

An editorial in The Independent noted that some other Asian countries impose the death penalty for drug-smuggling, and commented that the execution "was less the arrogance of a rising power than evidence that China is still feeling its way in the wider world". George Walden wrote in The Times that he felt if the British government had been more discreet Shaikh might have been reprieved, and that "if we wish to influence China on capital punishment, a little historical humility may be in order". British commentators critical of the UK government's response were Josephine McDermott of The Daily Telegraph who compared the government's "sabre-rattling" approach to the British attitude during the First Opium War in 1839; Michael White of The Guardian, who felt that China would not be interested in "lectures from Europeans on the morality of the drugs trade". Tony Parsons of the Daily Mirror supported China's strong stance against drug peddling, and said the British government's reaction was "shrill beyond belief".

People's Republic of China

Official view Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Jiang Yu said, "Nobody has the right to speak ill of China's judicial sovereignty. We express our strong dissatisfaction and opposition to the British Government's unreasonable criticism of the case. We urge the British to correct their mistake in order to avoid harming China–UK relations." A biannual summit session between China and the UK on human rights scheduled for early January was "postponed" by China in what The Daily Telegraph said was "widely thought to be a rebuke to the UK for its public criticism of China over the execution of Akmal Shaikh".

Other views An online survey by the China Daily, a newspaper owned and operated by the Chinese Communist Party, showed 77.5% in favour of the execution and 16% opposing. Vocal supporters included overseas Chinese, legal specialists, government officials as well as journalists. A professor at the Shanghai Institute for European Studies accused Labour politicians of trying to capitalise on the issue of China's human rights for political advantage in the upcoming election. An academic at Fudan University said the British criticism lacked legal and moral basis; their reaction was "unreasonable" and showed "considerable cultural arrogance"; another one at Tsinghua University considered the British politicians' reaction an attempt to "create sentiments and manipulate the public". Wang Dawei, a professor at China People's Public Security University, said that Britain and China should respect each other's differences in ideology and moral standards, rather than "using their own moral standards to judge, condemn and demonise China." He suggested that to act otherwise as a result of international pressure would be a return to the extraterritorial privileges that had been granted to many foreign nationals in China in the latter half of the 19th and first half of the 20th century pursuant to the "unequal treaties". Jerome Cohen, an expert in Chinese law, commented in the US-Asia Law Institute that the main legal issue was the refusal of a psychiatric examination, and that China may review its judicial process in this regard both in light of international criticism, and internal pressure as the country "shares the world's abhorrence of punishing mentally irresponsible people" and after the execution of Yang Jia, who was also refused a psychiatric examination, the public sympathy prompted "some Chinese experts to seek necessary law reforms".

Reaction from the international media was broadly critical of the authorities, with Der Spiegel summarising German commentators as being universally critical of Beijing. Newsweek felt that the Chinese authorities had consolidated their position domestically by giving the impression to Chinese citizens that the government will "protect them the best way it knows how from the mentally unstable, whether they are carrying machetes or suitcases full of drugs", and Ireland's Sunday Independent felt that the West was being hypocritical for overlooking other human rights concerns in China while enjoying the Beijing Olympics.