Global death penalty sentences hit 26-year high, warns Amnesty

A global rise in the number of executions recorded last year saw more people put to death than at any point in the last quarter-century, according to Amnesty International data.

The human rights organisation said at least 1,634 people were executed in 2015, a rise of more than 50 per cent on the previous year, and the highest number recorded since 1989.

The figures only account for recorded executions, however, and exclude executions carried out in China where death penalty data is treated as a state secret.

“China remained the world’s top executioner, and Amnesty International believes that thousands of people were put to death and thousands of death sentences were imposed in 2015.

“There are signs that the number of executions in China has decreased in recent years, but the secrecy around the death penalty makes this impossible to confirm,” it said.

The recorded surge in executions was fuelled by three countries – Iran, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Together they were responsible for 89 per cent of the 1,634 recorded executions in 2015.

Colm O’Gorman, executive director of Amnesty International Ireland, said: “The rise in executions last year is profoundly disturbing. Not for the last 25 years have so many people been put to death by states around the world.

“In 2015 governments continued to deprive people of their lives on the false premise that the death penalty would make us safer.”

In Pakistan, more than 320 people were put do death, the highest number Amnesty has ever recorded for the country, and a trend facilitated by the lifting of a moratorium on civilian executions in December 2014.

Iran put at least 977 people to death in 2015, compared to at least 743 the year before, the vast majority for drug-related crimes.

Amnesty said Iran was also one of the world’s last executioners of juvenile offenders, in clear breach of international law, with four people aged under 18 at the time of their offence put to death last year.

In Saudi Arabia, at least 158 people were put to death last year, a 76 per cent rise. Most were beheaded, but authorities also used firing squads and sometimes displayed executed bodies in public.

Amnesty reported a notable rise in the number of executions recorded in Egypt and Somalia, while Bangladesh, India and Indonesia all resumed executions in 2015.

In Indonesia, 14 people were put to death for drug-related offences during the year.

The US carried out 28 executions, the lowest number since 1991. The number of death sentences imposed – at 52 – was the lowest number recorded since 1977.

Amnesty further noted that four countries completely abolished the death penalty from their laws in 2015 — Fiji, Madagascar, Republic of Congo and Suriname. Mongolia also passed a new criminal code abolishing the death penalty, which will take effect this year.

This brings to 140 the number of states across the globe which are abolitionist in law or practice.

Mr O’Gorman said: “Whatever the short-term setbacks, the long-term trend is still clear: the world is moving away from the death penalty. Those countries that still execute need to realize that they are on the wrong side of history and abolish the ultimate cruel and inhuman form of punishment.”