amendment to section 21 of the Clemency and Pardoning Act, obliging Supreme Court to uphold and execute sentences on death penalty. The amendment was accepted for debate in the Parliament with majority voting in favour of the amendment. The proposed revision was submitted to the Social Committee of the Parliament for review. If the amendment gets passed, the power vested with the President to grant clemency to sentences of capital punishment under article 115(s) of the Constitution will be removed. As a recent development, member of the parliament, who proposed the amendment to the Clemency and Pardoning Act, has withdrawn the amendment, for the purpose of re‐submitting the amendment to the Act, once Parliament approves Penal Code and Criminal Justice Procedure Bill. Nevertheless, the following month another parliament member submitted a similar amendment to Clemency and Pardoning Act obliging Supreme Court to uphold and execute sentences on death penalty and to uphold Islamic Shari’ah in the country. 39. In April, 2012, once again a parliament member submitted a bill enforcing death penalty. The argument for the proposal of the bill was the fact that 29 people had been killed in the past 3 years in gang related crimes. The proposed amendment to the Article 21 of the Clemency Act would require death penalty to be administered if Supreme Court upholds death sentence issued by a lower court or Supreme Court issues a death sentence14. 41. As mentioned above, article 10 (a) and (b) of the Constitution strictly and clearly stipulates that the religion of the country is Islam and no laws contrary to any tenet of Islam shall be enacted, thus abolition of death penalty may not be possible unless otherwise article 115(s) of the Constitution is amended. Similarly, there are several laws that is pending which could make an impact on the death penalty including, the passage of the revised Penal Code, Criminal Procedures Code, Evidence Bill and Witness Protection bill. Furthermore, Maldives is yet to establish an independent forensic institution to provide accurate information to support judiciary to make an impartial, accurate decision on matters concerning administration of death penalty. 42. State should facilitate the establishment of an independent forensic institution. It is imperative that State revise the current Penal Code to reflect the spirit of the new Constitution that was ratified in August, 2008 and in par with its international obligations, and also enact Criminal Procedure Code, Evidence Bill and Witness Protection Bill. It is Chapter: Article 6‐ Right to Life 40. Maldives has affirmed the UN Resolution of Moratorium on death penalty on December 18, 2007, which emphasizes all States that still provision capital punishment to “progressively restrict the use of the death penalty and reduce the number of offences for which it may be imposed”15. This resolution still needs to be endorsed by the Parliament. In addition, one of the recommendations of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) that is being considered by the State includes the ratification of the 2nd Optional Protocol to ICCPR. 19