A brief overview of discussions on the abolition of the death penalty in international forums.

UIA has been long involved in debates related to the death penalty. It repeatedly reiterates that individual and collective actions by lawyers must aim for an increase in the number of ratifications of the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and/or regional instruments in favor of its abolition, as well as an increase in the number of moratoria. UIA also upholds  the importance for retentionist States to comply with international standards regarding those facing the death penalty [2]. 

Although the global trend is to abolish the death penalty, Amnesty International [3] has revealed a significant increase of 53% in executions worldwide, from 579 recorded executions in 2021 to 883 in 2022. This increase is mainly due to the exponential growth in executions in the Middle East and North Africa regions. In addition to these stated executions, China, Vietnam and North Korea still maintain their practice of secrecy, as figures on capital punishment are classified as a State secret. In 2022, executions resumed in five countries [4].

In 2023, 112 States have totally abolished the death penalty for all crimes and nine States for ordinary crimes. Abolition is therefore continuing to make headway, but this progress remains insufficient.

Arguments based on the right to life, enshrined – among others – in Article 6 of the ICCPR, have been formulated in particular against States that apply the death penalty for crimes not involving intentional homicides, such as drug offences, economic crimes or treason [5]. 

Paragraphs 2, 4, 5 and 6 of Article 6 state that retentionist States must limit the death penalty to the “most serious crimes”, namely intentional killing.

UIA-IROL is particularly concerned by the issue of due process in death penalty cases. In 2022, many States still handed down death sentences through proceedings that failed to comply with international fair trial standards [6]. In 2019, the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights ruled that the mandatory imposition of the death penalty does not respect due process guarantees and violates the right to a fair trial [7]. The Working Group on Arbitrary Detention also perceives the denial of the right to a fair trial for a person facing the death penalty as particularly grave [8]. 

The imposition of the death penalty often stems from deep-rooted discriminations. People from the poorest communities are disproportionately affected by the death penalty [9]. A large majority of women on death row are from ethnic and racial minorities and have experienced gender-based violence [10] . Nowadays, LGBTQIA+ people still face discrimination in the application of the death penalty, as twelve States apply it for consensual same-sex relationships [11]. 

If States are to abolish the death penalty, this must not be accompanied by a tightening of their penal policy. Several countries have replaced the death penalty with life imprisonment, sometimes without any possibility of parole or review. If there is one lesson to be learned from the death penalty, it is that it does not act as a deterrent [12]. Consequently, life imprisonment, which replaces a cruel and barbaric act with a slow and painful death, will have no dissuasive effect on society either.

Abolitionist States must therefore adopt a rehabilitation approach, reserving life imprisonment for the most serious crimes, i.e. those involving intentional killing, which must be accompanied by an individualized period of unconditional imprisonment and must be proportionate to the seriousness of the crime. They must also offer the possibility of parole and review, in accordance with internationally recognized human rights [13] .

The issue of the death penalty is on the agenda of the 54th session of the Human Rights Council, being held in Geneva from 11 September to 13 October 2023.

Our focus will mostly be on these discussions. Moreover, we will be calling for action on the World Day against the Death Penalty, set on 10 October. It will focus for the second year on the relationship between the application of the death penalty and torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Lastly, UIA, through UIA-IROL, is closely following the work of the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty. More recently, we have been paying attention to the progress of the Draft Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the abolition of the death penalty in Africa. UIA-IROL has joined the working group on the draft protocol and hopes to contribute to the progress of the law in this area, which should be of concern to all lawyers. Indeed, as the Secretary General of the United Nations has reminded us, the abolition of the death penalty is essential for the fight to advance human rights [14] .

By Anouk Kermiche
Paris, France

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[1] United Nations, Human Rights Council, Report of the Secretary General, Question of the death penalty, A/HRC/54/33, §65.

[2]  See the various UIA resolutions on the death penalty (esp. Resolution on the death penalty – 2003, Statement on the state of the death penalty – 2011, Resolution on the death penalty and conditions of detention and treatment of persons sentenced to death : mobilisation of bars – 2019 ; Resolution on the need for transparency in the imposition and application of the death penalty, 2022), as well as the statements published to mark the World Day against the Death Penalty (10 October).

[3] Amnesty International Global Report, Death Sentences and executions, 2022.

[4]  Afghanistan, Kuwait, Myanmar, the State of Palestine and Singapore.

[5] Amnesty International Global Report, Death Sentences and executions, 2022, p. 12 : Afghanistan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belarus, China, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Malaysia, Myanmar, North Korea, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Vietnam and Yemen.

[6] Ibidem, p. 13.

[7] African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, Ally Rajabu v. Republic of Tanzania, 28 November 2019, §§110-111.

[8]  Working Group on Arbitrary Detention of the Human Rights Council of the United Nations, Opinion n°32/2019 concerning Saeed Malekpour (Islamic Republic of Iran), A/HRC/WGAD/2019/32, 9 September 2019, § 47.

[9]  United Nations, Office of the High Commissioner, Death penalty disproportionately affects the poor, UN rights experts warn, 6 October 2017.

[10] Cornell Law School, Report, “Judged for More than her crime – A Global Overview of Women Facing the Death Penalty”, September 2018.  

[11] Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Iran, Mauritania, Qatar, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Brunei.

 [12] Amnesty International, « La peine de mort n’est pas dissuasive », June 2006 (only available in French) ; United Nations, « Conseil des droits de l’Homme : la peine capitale ne permet pas de réduire les taux d’homicides (Bachelet) », 23 February 2021 (only available in French).

[13] See for instance : European Court of Human Rights, Grand Chamber, Vinter v. the United Kingdom, applications no. 66069/09, 130/10 et 3896/10, 9 July 2013 ; Mexican Supreme Court, 2 October 2001 : see Vanessa MAASKAMP, « Extradition and Life imprisonment », Law reviews, 6 January 2003 ; Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, Rules and regulations, Chapter 11. No. 7, 1950, § 281.

[14] United Nations, Human Rights Council, Report of the Secretary General, Question of the death penalty, A/HRC/54/33, §65.