Nearly half of all known exe­cu­tions to date in 2025 in Iran (244) and Saudi Arabia (50) have been for drug-relat­ed crimes, track­ing close­ly pat­terns doc­u­ment­ed by Harm Reduction International (HRI) for 2024. According to HRI’s new report, The Death Penalty for Drug Offenses: Global Overview 2024, the use of the death penal­ty for drug-relat­ed crimes reached ​“cri­sis lev­els” in 2024. At least 615 peo­ple were known to be exe­cut­ed on drug-relat­ed charges world­wide, 607 of which took place in Iran (at least 485) and Saudi Arabia (122). This marks a 32% increase from 2023 and the ​“dead­liest year on record” since 2015, accord­ing to HRI. Drug-relat­ed exe­cu­tions account­ed for about 40% of all known exe­cu­tions world­wide in 2024 and seem to be on track to reach almost half of all exe­cu­tions in 2025. 

Thirty-four coun­tries retain the death penal­ty for drug-relat­ed offens­es, even though non­vi­o­lent drug offens­es do not meet the inter­na­tion­al legal thresh­old lim­it­ing the death penal­ty to the ​“most seri­ous” crimes. In 2024, drug-relat­ed exe­cu­tions were con­firmed in Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Singapore. HRI assumes they also occurred in the high appli­ca­tion states of China, North Korea, and Vietnam, which heav­i­ly cen­sor death penal­ty-relat­ed infor­ma­tion. While almost four in five known exe­cu­tions for drug offense occurred in Iran in 2024, and while Singapore con­tin­ues to tout its long held puni­tive approach to address­ing drug-relat­ed crimes, Saudi Arabia saw a sig­nif­i­cant surge in drug-relat­ed exe­cu­tions in 2024 (122) after only two such exe­cu­tions in 2023 — a 6000% increase year-over-year. In a notable coun­tertrend, Vietnam is con­sid­er­ing leg­is­la­tion to elim­i­nate the death penal­ty for eight of 18 offens­es, includ­ing ille­gal drug transport. 

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Article of Interest: Maricopa County Investigation: Capital Cases are Costly, Lack Transparency in Charging Decisions, and Rarely End in Death Sentences

A joint inves­ti­ga­tion by *ProPublica* and *ABC15 Arizona* reviewed more than 300 cas­es over the past two decades where Maricopa County...