Vietnamese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Le Thi Thu Hang

She said that death penalty is an issue of national sovereignty and criminal justice as many countries still implement this practice. The spokeswoman cited key international conventions on human rights to which Vietnam is a member. She said: “Death penalty in Vietnam is only applied to extremely serious crimes in line with the convention on civil and political rights. Related trial proceedings strictly respect Vietnamese criminal law to ensure the defendants’ rights, especially the principle of presumption of innocence, transparency and fairness. Vietnam has many times reduced the number of crimes subject to death penalty. The 2015 Criminal Code which came into force last year has removed death penalty in 8 crimes as well as cases where convicts are under 18 or above 75 or fostering child under 36 months.”