Brunei Won't Enforce Gay Sex Death Penalty After Backlash

Brunei's sultan has announced death by stoning for gay sex and adultery will not be enforced after a global backlash, but critics Monday called for harsh sharia laws to be abandoned entirely.

In a speech late Sunday, Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah said a moratorium on capital punishment that already applies to Brunei's regular criminal code would also extend to its new sharia code, which includes death by stoning for various crimes.

The code, which also punishes theft with the amputation of hands and feet, fully came into force last month in the small sultanate on Borneo island, making it the only country in East or Southeast Asia with sharia law at the national level.

The move sparked anger from governments and rights groups, the United Nations slammed it as a "clear violation" of human rights while celebrities led by actor George Clooney called for Brunei-owned hotels to be boycotted.

In a televised address, the all-powerful sultan made his first public comments about the furore and took the rare step of addressing criticism, saying there had been "many questions and misperceptions" regarding the sharia laws.

"Both the common law and the sharia law aim to ensure peace and harmony of the country," he insisted, according to an official translation of his speech.

Some crimes in Muslim-majority Brunei including murder and drug-trafficking were already punishable with death by hanging under the regular criminal code -- which is enforced alongside the sharia code -- but no one has been executed for decades.

Hassanal said that "we have practised a de facto moratorium on the execution of death penalty for cases under the common law.

"This will also be applied to cases under the (sharia penal code), which provides a wider scope for remission."