British Ambassador Tim Hitchens has expressed concern about Japan's continued use of the death penalty and encouraged the Japanese public, including lawmakers, to promote debate on capital punishment.
"The death penalty hurts human dignity. It cannot be proved to have deterrent power against serious crimes and it brings about an irreversible outcome in case of misjudgments," Hitchens said at a Tokyo symposium Wednesday on the issue. "We cannot have a perfect judicial system."
While more than two-thirds of the world's nations have abolished the death penalty, a government survey here shows more than 80 percent of Japanese support it.