Led by the president of the Episcopal Commission for Justice and Peace, the representatives of the country’s main religions presented a petition to the National Assembly in support of a draft bill that would ban capital punishment. Every human being’s life "depends on the Lord. Even criminals are children of God,” the bishop of Daejeon told AsiaNews. To improve things, “We must start from a society’s foundations and fix them”.

Seoul (AsiaNews) – Representatives from South Korea’s main religions have submitted a petition to the country’s National Assembly in support of a bipartisan draft bill to abolish the death penalty.

Led by Mgr Lazzaro You Heung-sik, president of the Episcopal Commission for Justice and Peace, the delegation met with Members of the National Assembly to "place man at the centre of society, even when he does wrong and crimes are committed".

A Protestant leader, a traditional Buddhist monk and a Won Buddhist monk accompanied the Catholic clergyman.

The group met with lawmakers and journalists on Monday, the day the draft was presented. AsiaNews spoke to Mgr You about it.

"Out of 299 Members of the National Assembly, 172 have signed this petition. Religious leaders have come together for this battle because we all agree that life is not in the hands of man."

“South Korea has enforced a de facto moratorium on executions,” said the prelate. “However, this is not enough.”

“We have presented the same request four times,” the prelate explained, “but it never made it to the National Assembly. Now the atmosphere has changed. A lawmaker told me that the bill should go through. The final discussion is scheduled for September."

On Monday, lawmakers submitted a bipartisan bill to the National Assembly to abolish the death penalty, citing a clause in the South Korean Constitution that requires citizens to “respect human dignity.”

The new draft bill aims to raise Korea’s status to that of an outright abolitionist country, said chief sponsor Rep. Yoo Ihn-tae of the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy.

“It is time we ban the death penalty here, in a country that has produced a UN secretary-general and is a member of the UN Human Rights Council,” Yoo added, referring to United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon.

Now the draft bill must go to the Legislation and Judiciary Committee and plenary voting at the National Assembly, before receiving final approval from the Cabinet and become law.

In December 2014, when the UN voted to abolish the death penalty in the world, South Korea abstained with 33 other nations.

For Mgr You, every human being’s life "depends on the Lord. Even criminals are children of God.”

“Some do the wrong thing,” he noted, “and some do the wrong thing because society never loved them, because of the social context that somehow turned them into a criminal.”

“We must start from a society’s foundations and fix them, putting people at the centre to avoid selfishness and failure of every kind."

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• korea
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• abolition