HUMAN rights groups have applauded Malaysia’s move to scrap the mandatory death penalty.

The groups said today that this was a major step forward in the push for the abolition of capital punishment in south-east Asia.

On Monday, legislators approved Bills to give courts the option of imposing hefty prison sentences of between 30 and 40 years and caning not fewer than 12 times.

Previously, courts had no choice but to use hanging as the punishment for a range of crimes, including murder, drug trafficking, treason, kidnapping and acts of terror.

Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch said that the reform could help “break the logjam on forward movement towards abolition of the death penalty” in the 10-member Association of South-East Asian Nations.

He said: “Far too many Asean states like to brandish the death penalty as some sort of big stick to scare criminals, but that tactic is not really working.”

“Hopefully, the Malaysia move will signal a step back from the death penalty that will be picked up by other states like Thailand, Laos, Brunei and elsewhere who have not put people to death for some time,” Mr Robertson added.

Cambodia and the Philippines are the only two countries in the region to have abolished the death penalty and there have been calls in Manila for its revival.

Singapore resumed executions last year by hanging 11 people, following a hiatus due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

In Myanmar a de facto moratorium on the death penalty, in place since 1989, ended last year when the country’s military rulers executed four political prisoners.

Mr Robinson said that the Malaysian government should show regional leadership by encouraging other Asean members to rethink their continued use of the death penalty.

He also urged Malaysia to abolish whipping, which he described as a “feudal anachronism.”

Charles Hector of the Malaysians Against Death Penalty and Torture group said it was clear that capital punishment had failed to deter crime as the number of killings and drug-trafficking cases remained high.

Once the Bills are passed by the Senate and signed into law by the king, nearly 850 prisoners on death row who had exhausted all appeals will be able to seek a review of their death sentences, but not their convictions.

About 500 other death-row inmates are still going through the appeal process.

Dozens more who are serving natural-life sentences can then seek to have them commuted.