Japan hangs three prisoners after 18-month stay of executions

Anger and dismay as government resumes capital punishment in same week it won Amnesty's praise for apparent moratorium

Critics of the Japanese government of Yoshihiko Noda believe executions have been resumed to distract attention from its efforts to increase consumption tax. Photograph: Corbis

Japan has carried out its first executions in more than 18 months, hanging three death row inmates on Thursday and angering campaigners who believed the country was moving towards abolition of the death penalty.

Reports said the three men were hanged at prisons in Tokyo, Hiroshima and Fukuoka. They included Yasuaki Uwabe, who was convicted of killing five people at a train station in 1999.

The executions are the first since July 2010; none of the 132 people on death row was executed in 2011, the first time a year had passed without executions for 19 years.

Their executions came as a blow to campaigners, who only this week welcomed Japan's apparent de facto moratorium on capital punishment. Hideki Wakabayashi, executive director of Amnesty International Japan, accused the Democratic party of Japan (DPJ) government of reneging on an earlier promise to look seriously at its use of the death penalty.

"We still need to have a national debate," Wakabayashi told the Guardian. "But while we are doing that there has to be a moratorium on executions. The DPJ is supposed to support human rights. The executions also run against the international movement against he death penalty. I don't know where Japan thinks it is going with this."

There is speculation that the justice minister, Toshio Ogawa, has come under pressure from senior DPJ colleagues, including the prime minister, Yoshihiko Noda, to sign off on executions while the party attempts to sell a controversial consumption tax rise to the public, which remains overwhelmingly in favour of the death penalty.

"Public support for Noda's cabinet is declining, so my personal feeling is that this was one of many steps aimed at boosting its approval ratings," Wakabayashi said.

Earlier this week Amnesty International had singled out Japan for praise over the absence of executions in 2011, despite evidence that successive justice ministers had come under intense pressure to sign death warrants. In the announcement, Amnesty's Catherine Baber did note that "executions could resume at any time".

"We continue to be concerned for the roughly 130 people on death row, including several prisoners with mental illnesses, and we call on the minister of justice not to resume executions but rather to work towards abolition."

In September 2010 the then justice minister, Keiko Chiba, ordered a review of the death penalty. Her four immediate successors refused to approve executions, but Ogawa, who was appointed to the post in January, said the review had reached an impasse.

"I don't really want to do it, but it is part of the justice minister's job description," he told journalists. "With 130 inmates on death row and public opinion 85% in favour of the death sentence, it would be inexcusable of me not to sign off on executions."

In a damning 2009 report, Amnesty accused the Japanese authorities of subjecting death row inmates to "cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment".

Campaigners have also voiced concern over the safety of several convictions, including that of Masaru Okunishi, who has spent four decades on death row for poisoning five women in 1961.

Prisoners are not told when they will be executed until a few hours before they are led away to the gallows, and their relatives and lawyers are informed only after the execution has been carried out.

In a report issued this week, Amnesty noted a rise in the number of executions worldwide in 2011 [PDF], mainly due to a significant increase in the Middle East.

The US - the only G7 country to carry out executions last year - is one of 58 countries, including Japan, China and Iran, that retain capital punishment. More than 140 countries, including all EU members, have abolished the death penalty in law or practice.

Ethiopian maid publicly abused in Lebanon takes her own life – video

An Ethiopian domestic worker who was filmed as she was attacked in public outside the Ethiopian embassy in Beirut has taken her own life. The video, aired by Lebanese television, has caused outrage in the country, where reports of mistreatment of domestic workers are common. The woman's employer, who was seen trying to bundle her into a car, has denied beating her

* Warning: video contains violence

Jean-Luc Mélenchon moves from left to centre stage in battle to be president

Anti-capitalist firebrand whose ideas include 100% fat cat tax on earnings above £300,000 wins attention and support in the polls

ean-Luc Mélenchon at a campaign meeting in Lille. Photograph: Francois Lo Presti/ AFP/Getty Images

Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the hard left, anti-capitalist firebrand who is rising in the presidential election polls, is all over the French papers – billed as the great surprise, main event and key revelation of the campaign.

With crowds spilling into the street at his packed rally in Lille this week, and tens of thousands recently flocking to the Bastille to hear him call for a "civic insurrection", Mélenchon has been credited with 14% in the polls by BVA.

His numbers have catapulted him into the realms of becoming a possible "third man" in the first round vote on 22 April.

Mélenchon's initial aim is to overtake and annihilate his arch-nemesis, the National Front's Marine Le Pen, in the race for the working class and protest vote, as he explained on France Info radio on Thursday.

Mélenchon is already famous for his scathing attacks on opponents, and his public savagery of what he terms the "half-demented" Le Pen has become the stuff of campaign legend.

But commentators are now wondering whether François Hollande, the Socialist frontrunner, should be worried that Mélenchon's rise will eat into his vote.

Most of Mélenchon's voters are predicted to transfer to Hollande in the second round, as the broad French left is keen to do anything to stop Nicolas Sarkozy.

Some say the current Mélenchon-mania is good for the left, boosting its overall score. Others, who want Hollande to be the clear winner in the first round before the final runoff, say Mélenchon's rise should be contained.

So far, Hollande's strategy has been to carry on much as usual, pressing home his ideas such as a 75% tax on income over the €1m (£836,000) mark, and arguing that a huge, strategic rallying Socialist vote is needed in the first round in order to beat Sarkozy in the 6 May runoff.

Arnaud Montebourg, on the left of Hollande's Socialist team, on Thursday called on Mélenchon to save any aggressive attacks for Sarkozy, not Hollande, warning that the right loves to delight in any cracks on the left.

Mélenchon, a one-time Trotskyist and former teacher, spent 30 years in the Socialist party, where he served as a minister and senator.

He called for a no vote on the European constitution in 2005 before leaving to co-found his own Parti de Gauche. He is now running for a leftist alliance, Front de Gauche, which includes the once powerful Communist party.

His ideas include capping maximum fat cat salaries at €360,000 (£300,000), after which income tax would be set at 100%.

Historically, the French "left of the left" usually takes 10%-12% of the first round presidential vote, split between various candidates, including the Trotskyists.

This time Mélenchon has siphoned voters from the smaller far-left candidates and focused the radical spotlight on himself.

People question whether he wants a government role, but he swears he will not sit in a Socialist party government. He also says there will be no negotiations.

Ukraine woman who was gang raped and set on fire, dies

Oksana Makar was attacked by three men in the Mykolaiv region of Ukraine. Photograph: AP

An 18-year-old Ukrainian woman has died in hospital after being gang-raped, half-strangled and set on fire. The attack on Oksana Makar led to hundreds of protesters taking to the streets in the town of Mykolayiv in the south of the country after police released two of her three suspected attackers whose parents had political connections, reigniting a debate on corruption in the former Soviet republic.

The two men were rearrested and police disciplined after the intervention of President Viktor Yanukovych. The three young men have been charged with rape and one with attempted murder. An 18-year-old Ukrainian woman who prosecutors say was gang-raped, half-strangled and then set on fire in an attack that sparked street protests in a provincial Ukrainian town, has died, a hospital official said on Thursday.

Hundreds of people took to the streets earlier this month after police released two of Oksana Makar's three suspected attackers whose parents had political connections, reigniting a public debate on corruption in the ex-Soviet republic.

The two men were rearrested and police disciplined after the intervention of President Viktor Yanukovich who sent an investigating team to the town of Mykolayiv in southern Ukraine.

All three young men have been charged with rape and one of them additionally with attempted murder.

Ukrainian media regularly report cases of children of the country's wealthy elite, who are known as "mazhory", escaping punishment from traffic offences, or from more serious crimes including causing fatal road accidents while at the wheel.

The interior minister, Vitaly Zakharchenko, confirmed earlier this month that the parents of at least one of the three suspects were former government officials in the Mykolaiv region.

"Lung bleeding began and then her heart activity stopped," said Emil Fistal, head of the specialist burns unit where Makar was taken for treatment.

Local media claimed that Makar met two of the three accused in a local bar on 10 March and after spending some time there with them, went to the apartment of the third.

The reports allege she was then raped and that one of the suspected attackers tried to strangle her with a cord. They allegedly wrapped her in a blanket, took her to a pit on a building site and tried to set her body on fire before escaping.

She was found by a passing motorist and taken to hospital with serious burns. She had both feet and an arm amputated in surgery, according to the reports.

Trayvon Martin aftermath video casts doubt on George Zimmerman's account

Police video recorded after shooting shows George Zimmerman without wounds he claimed Trayvon Martin inflicted

Surveillance video depicting Trayvon Martin's killer hours after the teenager's death has cast doubt on his claims that he was injured in a vicious fight with the victim.

Seen in handcuffs and accompanied by police officers, self-appointed neighbourhood watchman George Zimmerman displays no obvious signs of having been attacked.

The CCTV footage has prompted further questions over Zimmerman's account of the incident. Earlier reports suggested that 17-year-old Martin had attacked the older man first, with the bloodied gunman pulling the trigger in self-defence.

According to police statement leaked to the Orlando Sentinel this week,
Zimmerman was punched in the face before his head was pounded into the sidewalk by Martin during the incident.

The 28-year-old's account of the attack in Sanford, Florida, was said to have been confirmed by eyewitnesses.

Zimmerman's attorney, Craig Sonner, has said repeatedly that his client's nose was broken during the fight, which took place after Martin, an unarmed black teenager, noticed that the neighbourhood watchman had been trailing him from a local shop.

Reports had suggested that police responding to the incidents found Zimmerman bleeding from both his nose and the back of his head.

But CCTV footage, first released by ABC News, appears to cast doubt on the extent of the shooter's injuries.

In it, the 28-year-old's head and face are clearly visible. There appears to be no clear signs of any wounds. Likewise, there are no obvious indications of blood on the front of his T-shirt that could indicate evidence of a broken nose.

It was already known that the shooter was treated by paramedics at the scene, but the lack of any clear injuries has led some to suggest that they have been overstated.

Sanford police confirmed that the man in the video footage is Zimmerman.
It shows him being escorted into a police station shortly after the incident on 26 February.

Responding to the latest development, Ben Crump, a lawyer for the Martin family, said: "This certainly doesn't look like a man who police said had his nose broken and his head repeatedly smashed into the sidewalk."

He added: "George Zimmerman has no apparent injuries in this video, which dramatically contradicts his version of the events of February 26."

Since that date, just over a month ago, anger has spread from the local community across the US, with protests and rallies demanding Zimmerman's arrest.

The neighbourhood watchman began following the unarmed teenager as he walked back to the home of his father's girlfriend.

The youth, who was serving out a school suspension at the time, was wearing a hooded top and was acting "suspiciously," his killer has said.

Zimmerman has said that he pulled the trigger after he was set upon by Martin in what one relative of the 28-year-old said was "a fight for his life."
The shooter's father told Orlando TV station WOFL that Martin confronted his son, saying "something to the effect of, 'You're going to die now' or 'You're going to die tonight'."

He then pummelled the neighbourhood watchman so badly that armed man was forced to shoot, Robert Zimmerman added.

But claims of a racial element to the killing have added fuel to the growing disquiet over Zimmerman's subsequent release.

The level of anger directed against him has forced Zimmerman to go into hiding amid death threats directed toward both him and his family.

On Wednesday, film director Spike Lee was forced to apologise after he retweeted the home address of an elderly couple he believed to be connected to Zimmerman.

David and Elaine McClain, who are in their 70s and are unrelated to the case, have said that they were forced to leave their home out of safety concerns after the post was picked up by the moviemaker's 250,000 followers.

German Gorbuntsov's wife issues appeal over Russian banker's shooting

Wife asks for information on those behind east London attack that has left millionaire husband under armed guard in hospital

Russian banker German Gorbuntsov, who is in hospital after being shot in east London. Photograph: EPA

The wife of the millionaire Russian banker who was shot and critically wounded by a lone gunman in east London has appealed for the public to help find those responsible in this country or in his homeland.

Lorissa Gorbuntsov, whose husband is under armed guard in a London hospital, made the public appeal as the police said they were working with the Russian authorities to find the gunman, who used a pistol fitted with a silencer to fire four bullets at German Gorbuntsov.

"We as a family would like to appeal for any person, in this country or outside the UK, to come forward and provide the police with any information which will assist in the capture of the person or persons behind the attempted murder of my husband, German," she said.

"This is an act of pure unexpected violence, which should be treated as so. Please come forward so that justice can prevail."

She said her family was going through an "emotional and complicated time".

Inquiries are leading detectives into the opaque world of Russian organised crime as the hunt continues for the gunman, who fled after shooting his victim in east London on the night of 20 March.

Scotland Yard has confirmed that the pistol used by the hitman has been recovered. It is understood to have been found in bushes close to where the victim was shot in the shadow of the Canary Wharf tower.

The attack near Gorbuntsov's apartment block was not initially acknowledged by the Metropolitan police beyond a press release saying a shooting had taken place in east London without details of the victim's nationality or the fact he was a businessman. Scotland Yard only confirmed the victim's name two days after news of the attack was published in the Russian media.

Contract killings are one of the recognised security threats in the runup to the Olympic Games.

The Met's deputy assistant commissioner, Steve Kavanagh, said on Thursday that detectives were working actively with the Russian authorities. Relations between law enforcement bodies in both countries reached breaking point over the investigation into the poisoning of the dissident Alexander Litvinkenko in 2006.

The former KGB officer Andrei Lugovoi was charged with Litvinenko's murder in May 2007 – a move that sparked a diplomatic crisis between London and Moscow and the tit-for-tat expulsion of diplomats. Russia is refusing to extradite Lugovoi.

The inquiry into the attack on Gorbuntsov is said to be focusing on organised crime rather than any state-sponsored targeting of the banker, who amassed his fortune through having stakes in six major banks in Russia and Moldova. But any investigation into organised crime emanating from Russia will examine potential crossovers between criminality and power and politics.

Gorbuntsov remains in a critical but stable condition. Police are seeking the taxi driver who picked him up in Bishopsgate, in the City of London, at about 7pm on Tuesday and dropped him off at his apartment block in Byng Street shortly before the shooting.

Gorbuntsov had recently given information to Russian police investigating the attempted murder of another banker, Alexander Antonov, in 2009. Three Chechen men were convicted of the attempted murder but police never established who had hired them. Investigators in Moscow reopened the case earlier this month after receiving information from Gorbuntsov.

The suspected gunman is described as a slim, white male, about 6ft tall, who was wearing a dark, hooded top.

End of the road for Beatle wheelchair as EU judges rule in pop group's favour

John Lennon and Paul McCartney of the Beatles in the Apple Corps office in 1968. Judges have ruled that a product using the pop group's name would benefit unfairly from the association. Photograph: Jane Bown

A bid to trademark the word beatle for use on electric wheelchairs has been blocked by EU judges.

They ruled there was a risk of confusion with the pop group – even though the youth and vigour represented by the group contrasted with the reduced mobility of wheelchair customers.

There was in fact a connection, the judges said on Thursday, because some original Beatles fans may now be wheelchair users.

Dutch company You-Q has been promoting the Beatle wheelchair on its website.

But the ruling from the European court of justice backed the EU trademark office's decision to disallow Beatle wheelchairs to be trademarked.

The verdict is a victory for Apple Corps, the company formed by the Beatles, which challenged the You-Q bid.

The judges said a product using the group's name would benefit unfairly from the association.

The name of the group has "an enormous reputation for sound records, video records and films and a reputation, albeit lesser, for merchandising products such as toys and games", the court ruled.

Visually, phonetically and conceptually, the names the Beatles and Beatles were very similar to the trademark requested for the wheelchairs.

"Moreover, those marks have a distinctive character so that, when faced with them, the public at large, in particular in the non-English speaking countries of the EU, will immediately think of the eponymous group and their products," said the ruling.

The judges said it was likely that, if allowed to use the Beatle name, You-Q would take unfair advantage of the "repute and the consistent selling power" of the pop group.

"The image conveyed [by the name of the Beatles] is, even after 50 years of existence, still synonymous with youth and a certain counterculture of the 1960s, an image which is still positive," said the ruling.

"That positive image could benefit the goods covered by the mark applied for, since the relevant public, on account specifically of the handicap in question, would be particularly attracted by the very positive image of freedom, youth and mobility associated with the Beatles.

"This is especially so as a part of the public targeted by You-Q's goods belongs to the generation of persons who knew the Beatles' goods in the 60s and some of whom may now be concerned by the goods covered by the mark applied for.

"That image transfer would therefore enable You-Q to introduce its own trademark on the market without incurring any of the great risk or costs, in particular advertising costs, connected with launching a newly created mark."