China may eliminate capital punishment for some economic crimes as it moves to curb use of the death penalty in a country believed to execute more people than the rest of the world combined.
China's National People's Congress will this week consider an amendment to the nation's criminal law that will take 13 offences off the list of 68 crimes now punishable by death, state-run Xinhua news agency said Monday.
According to Amnesty International, China executes more people each year than the rest of the world put together, but the exact number remains a closely guarded state secret.
China has taken measures in recent years to rein in the use of capital punishment, including requiring the country's supreme court to review all such sentences before they are carried out.
Most executions are carried out for violent crimes such as murder and robbery, the China Daily reported last month, but drug trafficking and some corruption cases also are punishable by death.
Xinhua said crimes that may become exempt from capital punishment include tax fraud and "fraudulent activities involving financial bills".
Other offences including smuggling of cultural relics, precious metals and rare animals may also be wiped off the list.
"Considering China's current economic and social development reality, appropriately removing the death penalty from some economy-related non-violent offences will not negatively affect social stability nor public security," legislator Li Shishi was quoted as saying by Xinhua.
The move would "better protect human rights", the report said.
Of the 68 current capital crimes in China, 44 do not involve violent acts.
The draft amendment will also aim to forbid the death penalty against convicted criminals aged 75 years or more, the China News Service said.
In a report earlier this year, Amnesty said the number executed in China was "believed to be in the thousands", compared with 2009's second-ranked executioner Iran, which the rights group said carried out at least 388 last year.
Firing squads have traditionally been used in Chinese executions, however in recent years the state has increasingly adopted lethal injections.
Amnesty's deputy director for Asia-Pacific, Catherine Baber, welcomed the news that China may curb the use of the death penalty but questioned the impact of the reforms.
"We are still waiting for the Chinese government to release the data that shows these proposed revisions are more than just legal housekeeping, removing crimes which have seldom been punished with the death penalty in recent years," she said.
The amendment will be read during this week's session of the parliament's standing committee, its key law-making body.
Draft laws are typically read several times before being adopted.
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