JAMAICA TO HANG DOZENS OF CONVICTS

A second Caribbean country is to begin executing 50 death row inmates
following the hangings of the "Trinidad nine" a fortnight ago.

Jamaica's decision to hang the convicts will lead to protests from the
Labour MP Gerald Kaufman during a special debate in the Commons
tomorrow. The former shadow foreign secretary will call for the end of
UK aid to all Caribbean countries which still impose the death penalty.

In Jamaica, Neville Lewis, who was convicted of murder in 1994, will
be the first man to be hanged since 1988.

British lawyers representing him and his co-defendant, Peter Blaine,
say they could be hanged within the next six months unless the
Jamaican government commutes their sentences.

But 10 days ago Percival Patterson, the Jamaican Prime Minister, said
during a visit to Canada that the "Trinidad nine" had set an important
precedent.

It is understood that the Jamaican administration is keen to follow
the lead set by its Caribbean neighbour.

Mr Kaufman's debate follows four failed attempts by the Foreign
Secretary, Robin Cook, to dissuade the Trinidad and Tobago government
from carrying out the executions of Dole Chadee and his gang, who were
hanged earlier this month.

While the Trinidad nine were all part of a notorious gang dealing in
drugs and murder, Lewis and Blaine have no previous convictions and
claim they were set up by the police.

Karen Aston, of the London law firm Allen & Overy, which is acting for
Blaine, said the men were told that if they signed statements that
blamed each other for the robbery of a car and the murder of its
owner, they would not be prosecuted.

Both men claim not to know each other. Their appeal against their
convictions was turned down by the UK's Privy Council in 1997.

On Tuesday the Jamaican Court of Appeal dismissed the argument that
the conditions in which they were imprisoned breached their human
rights. It did, however, rule that the Governor General must wait
until the conclusion of their petitions to the Inter American
Commission on Human Rights before they may be executed. Jamaica pulled
out of the United Nations Human Rights Commission in 1997 in order to
stop lawyers representing death row inmates using it to drag out their
appeals.

Shelagh Simmons of Caribbean Justice, a UK-based organisation working
for the abolition of the death penalty, said the Jamaican government
had been spurred on by the Trinidad hangings and was determined to
carry out the executions.

Mr Kaufman, who has written in support of another Jamaican death row
inmate, Deon McTaggart, said the amount of "developmental assistance"
should be used to bring "leverage" against Caribbean countries that
retain the death penalty. Mr Kaufman said: "If they are independent
countries with independent penal policies then they can do without
money from our taxpayers until their human rights are improved."

A Foreign Office spokeswoman said this was not a policy that the
Government accepted: "We are not convinced this is the right way forward. It

would reinforce the wrong impression that we are picking on smaller
countries."