[WA 08/2003 - Philippines Children’s Day web action closing text]

The sentence of death is still hanging over seven child offenders in the Philippines. Amnesty International recently learned of another nine death row prisoners who were reportedly under eighteen at the time of the offence, bringing up to sixteen the number of children who are currently under sentence of death in the Philippines. Although the Philippines Supreme Court announced its intention to amend the Rules of Court to make it the duty of the prosecution, rather than only the defence, to establish the age of accused persons, no automatic and immediate process of removing death sentences on child offenders have yet been established.

Amnesty International continues to call on the Philippines government to remove death sentences which were passed on children, and ensure that no further child offenders will be sentenced to death.