http://www.larryjohnsononline.com/2009/11/... /

Iraq may hang 126 women by year’s end despite international appeals

Iraq is planning to execute up to 126 women by the end of this year. At least 9 may be hanged within the next two weeks. Human rights groups say the only crime committed by many of these women was to serve in the government of Saddam Hussein. Others, according to human rights groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, were convicted of common crimes based on confessions that were the result of torture.

Amnesty reports that at least 1,000 men and women are now on death row in Iraq, a country that has one of the highest rates of execution in the world. Amnesty released the following appeal in late August:

“At least nine women under sentence of death in Iraq are now in imminent danger of execution, as Iraq’s Presidential Council has ratified their death sentences. Three other women have been executed since early June.

The authorities have transferred a number of women to the 5th section of Baghdad’s al-Kadhimiya Prison, which is where condemned prisoners are held immediately before they are executed…