Nigeria Leader Pardons Man on Death Row

More than 720 men and 11 women are on death row in Nigeria and one of them has spent 24 years awaiting execution.

Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua on Friday pardoned a man who spent more than two decades on death row for armed robbery and requested amnesty for a 90-year old man sentenced to death.

The pardons come three weeks after global rights group Amnesty International said the Nigerian justice system was so flawed that it was sentencing people to death who may be innocent and that many suspects were waiting years to be tried.

Yar'Adua pardoned Ibrahim Aliyu, 57, who had been on death row for 22 years following three years in detention awaiting trial for armed robbery.

He also wrote to Rivers state Governor Rotimi Amaechi to ask him to pardon 90-year old Nze Enweremadu, who spent nine years awaiting trial for murder.

More than 720 men and 11 women are on death row in Nigeria and one of them has spent 24 years awaiting execution, Amnesty said in a report in October. It said more than 40 offenders were sentenced under the age of 18, against international law.

The rights group called on the government to declare a moratorium on executions as a first step towards abolishing the death penalty.

Amnesty said the Nigerian government had not officially reported any executions since 2002 but that at least seven convicts had been hanged in secrecy in 2006.