Singapore was Thursday urged to end the use of judicial corporal punishment after a security guard was sentenced to three months in jail and three strokes of the cane for spray-painting the word “Democracy” on a war memorial.
Mohamad Khalid Mohamad Yusop, 33, was sentenced on Monday after pleading to guilty to vandalism in a rare case of public dissent in the tightly controlled city-state.
He sprayed “Democracy” and a large “X” on the Cenotaph memorial, which commemorates Singapore’s dead in the two world wars.
“Mohamad Yusop exercised his right to free speech and expressed his political views about the failings of Singapore democracy, but writing on a public monument was the wrong place to share those opinions,” said Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division.
“But equally wrong is Singapore’s rights abuse in using corporal punishment against him, and the decision to imprison him for three months for an action that merited nothing more than a heavy fine.
Mr Robertson called for an end to judicial caning in Singapore, where male criminals under the age of 50 may be flogged for a wide range of offences.
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HRW urges Singapore to end caning
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