Amnesty International Global Report: Recorded Executions Highest in Five Years Reflects Increases in the Middle East and North Africa

According to an annu­al death penal­ty report by Amnesty International, 2022 saw the high­est num­ber of record­ed exe­cu­tions since 2017, pri­mar­i­ly due to increas­es in just a hand­ful of coun­tries in the Middle East and North Africa. The report also not­ed a slight decrease in the num­ber of new­ly imposed death sen­tences world­wide. In its report, Amnesty says use of the death penal­ty in sev­er­al coun­tries con­tin­ues to vio­late inter­na­tion­al law with pub­lic exe­cu­tions, exe­cu­tions of juve­niles or those with men­tal or intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ties, unfair tri­al pro­ceed­ings, and coerced con­fes­sions obtained under tor­ture or ill-treatment.

Global Report: Death Sentences and Executions 2022 states that there were 883 known exe­cu­tions in 20 coun­tries – a 53% increase from the pri­or year and the high­est num­ber since 2017. The actu­al num­ber of exe­cu­tions is like­ly high­er as num­bers from China, North Korea, and Vietnam are unknown due to secre­cy prac­tices. A 59% increase in exe­cu­tions in the Middle East and North Africa region, where 93% of the world’s known exe­cu­tions occur, was the lead­ing cause for this uptick glob­al­ly. Within this out­lier region, two coun­tries – Iran (70%) and Saudi Arabia (24%) – account for 94% of the 825 executions.

“Countries in the Middle East and North Africa region vio­lat­ed inter­na­tion­al law as they ramped up exe­cu­tions in 2022, reveal­ing a cal­lous dis­re­gard for human life. The num­ber of indi­vid­u­als deprived of their lives rose dra­mat­i­cal­ly across the region; Saudi Arabia exe­cut­ed a stag­ger­ing 81 peo­ple in a sin­gle day. Most recent­ly, in a des­per­ate attempt to end the pop­u­lar upris­ing, Iran exe­cut­ed peo­ple sim­ply for exer­cis­ing their right to protest,” said Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General.

Excluding the esti­mat­ed thou­sands of exe­cu­tions in China, the high­est num­ber of known exe­cu­tions occurred in Iran, where there was an 83% increase in exe­cu­tions from the pre­vi­ous year. Of the 576 exe­cu­tions in Iran, con­vic­tions for mur­der (48%) and drug-relat­ed offens­es (44%) were the largest cat­e­gories, with a 75% increase in exe­cu­tions for mur­der and a 93% increase in drug-relat­ed offens­es over the pre­vi­ous year. The num­ber of exe­cu­tions in Saudi Arabia tripled from 2021 to a total of 196 in 2022. Following the end of a 2020 mora­to­ri­um on the death penal­ty for drug-relat­ed offens­es, there were 57 exe­cu­tions for drug crimes record­ed in 2022. 

A total of 2,016 new death sen­tences was record­ed last year in 52 coun­tries, com­pared to 2,052 death sen­tences in 56 coun­tries dur­ing the pri­or year. However, there was a sig­nif­i­cant increase in the num­ber of new death sen­tences in sev­er­al coun­tries: Algeria (from 9 to 54), Egypt (from 356+ to 538), India (from 144 to 165), Kenya (from 14 to 79), Kuwait (from 5+ to 16+), Nigeria (from 56+ to 77+), and Tunisia (from 3+ to 26+). According to the report, at least 28,282 peo­ple were under sen­tence of death at the end of 2022, although accu­rate esti­mates were dif­fi­cult to obtain for China, Egypt, Iran, Libya, North Korea and Saudi Arabia. There were com­mu­ta­tions or par­dons in 26 coun­ties, and at least 28 exon­er­a­tions of pris­on­ers in four coun­tries – Kenya (20), Morocco/​Western Sahara (1), USA (2), Zimbabwe (5). 

Continuing the world­wide trend away from use of the death penal­ty, four coun­tries – Kazakhstan, Papua New Guinea, Sierra Leone and the Central African Republic – abol­ished the death penal­ty for all crimes, and two coun­tries – Equatorial Guinea and Zambia – abol­ished the death penal­ty for ordi­nary crimes only. At the United Nations General Assembly in December 2022, the ninth res­o­lu­tion call­ing for a glob­al mora­to­ri­um on the use of the death penal­ty with a view towards its ulti­mate abo­li­tion passed with the sup­port of a record 125 member states.