Pakistan was scheduled to hang a disabled, wheelchair-bound prisoner on Tuesday in the latest case to focus attention on the country’s controversial use of capital punishment.
The nation's president had not responded to mercy pleas from the prisoner’s family as of late Monday. A court in the Pakistani city of Lahore cleared the way for the execution last week after rejecting a last-ditch argument by his lawyers that hanging a paraplegic man would constitute cruel and unusual punishment.
The case has shocked human rights groups, which have accused Pakistan of carrying out “a conveyor belt of executions” since lifting a moratorium on capital punishment in December.