an Iraqi court sentenced three rebels to death for rape, kidnapping and murder, the first death sentences passed in connection with the ongoing insurgency.

Rahmatollah Ghanbarzehi Gorgich, an Iranian man convicted of raping a female student, was hanged in public in the southeastern city of Zahedan, in the Sistan-Baluchestan province.

two men accused of murdering a taxi driver were executed by a firing squad on the orders of a tribal council in rural Pakistan, witnesses said, highlighting the rule of deep-rooted tribal customs.

sixty-two prisoners were still under sentence of death although the death penalty was declared invalid in South Africa 10 years ago, the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg heard.

Tahassin Ali Mutar Janabi, an Iraqi army captain who served under ousted dictator Saddam Hussein, was sentenced to death.

a young man was hanged in public in the southern Iranian city of Ahwaz, accused of armed robbery and disturbing the peace.

sixteen people failed in their appeal against death sentences in Vietnam's biggest drug trafficking case, a court official in Ho Chi Minh City said.

the plight of Majda Mustapha Mahir, a 40-year old Moroccan woman condemned to death in Saudi Arabia for the murder of her husband in 1998, took Hands Off Cain and the Association of Moroccan Women in Italy to the streets of Rome in protest.

China's top prosecution office urged police to stop using illegal methods such as torture to force suspects to confess, after a series of high profile miscarriages of justice.

it was reported that the Baghdad offices of Iraq's prime minister, Ibrahim Jaafari, had been flooded with telegrams supporting the government's decision to reinstate the death penalty for terrorists.

seven people were sentenced to death by a Fast Track Court in Tirupattur, India, after being convicted of murdering three members of the same family.

Saddam Hussein could be on trial within two months, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said, but Giovanni Di Stefano, a London lawyer representing the former Iraqi dictator, warned several legal steps had to be taken first.