At an inter­na­tion­al death penal­ty con­fer­ence in Washington, DC, host­ed by the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, the European Union strong­ly renewed its call for a glob­al end to the use of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. In his open­ing remarks for the con­fer­ence, David O’Sullivan, the European Union’s Ambassador to the United States, expressed opti­mism about recent declines in the use of the death penal­ty in the United States and said ​“the abo­li­tion of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment … would put the U.S. on the right side of his­to­ry.” On June 22 – 24, 2017, gov­ern­ment rep­re­sen­ta­tives, non-gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions, abo­li­tion­ists, and death-penal­ty experts from around the world gath­ered on the cam­pus of Catholic University in Washington, DC for a con­fer­ence on the state of the death penal­ty through­out the world and a cel­e­bra­tion of the World Coalition’s 15th anniver­sary. The 2017 con­fer­ence looked in-depth at the rela­tion­ship between pover­ty and cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, with speak­ers from India, Nigeria, and the U.S. describ­ing the per­va­sive impact of pover­ty on crime, death-penal­ty charg­ing prac­tices, and access to qual­i­fied defense coun­sel and the courts. Other ses­sions includ­ed a pan­el of sev­en U.S. death-row exonerees, who dis­cussed their cas­es and the inher­ent risk of sen­tenc­ing inno­cent peo­ple to death. In his remarks, Ambassador O’Sullivan described as an ​“inher­ent flaw of the death penal­ty … that it is deeply root­ed in social injus­tice. Everywhere the death penal­ty is applied glob­al­ly, sta­tis­tics show that it dis­crim­i­nates against the poor, the minori­ties and the mar­gin­alised cit­i­zens of a soci­ety.” O’Sullivan said, “[a]s a union found­ed on democ­ra­cy, human rights and the rule of law, it is nat­ur­al for us to oppose [the death penal­ty].” He described cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment as ​“a dehu­man­iz­ing prac­tice” that dis­serves vic­tims’ fam­i­lies. ​“We are also con­vinced that it is an illu­sion to believe that the death penal­ty deters the most seri­ous crimes,” he said. ​“What we need, in the United States and in those coun­tries where the death penal­ty con­tin­ues to be legal, is a vibrant civ­il soci­ety work­ing in con­junc­tion with polit­i­cal lead­ers, who togeth­er with pub­lic sup­port will work to repeal the death penal­ty, thus end­ing this blight on our common humanity.”

(D. O’Sullivan, ​“Opening Remarks Ambassador David O’Sullivan | EU’s glob­al advo­ca­cy to abol­ish cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment,” Delegation of the European Union to the United States, June 23, 2017; A. Placais and J. Corredor, ​“World Coalition Conference to cel­e­brate 15th anniver­sary in Washington D.C.,” World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, June 9, 2017.) See International.

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