Entries tagged with “Amnesty International

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Aug 27, 2024

68 Human Rights Organizations Express Support for Iranian Prisoners’ No Death Penalty Tuesdays” Abolition Movement Entering Its 31st Week

Amidst a con­tin­ued post-elec­tion exe­cu­tion surge and increased sup­pres­sion of peace­ful prison protests, Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO) and 67 human rights orga­ni­za­tions across four con­ti­nents expressed their sup­port for the ongo­ing No Death Penalty Tuesdays” week­ly hunger strike move­ment cur­rent­ly span­ning 17 Iranian pris­ons across the coun­try. The August 27, 2024 state­ment, pub­lished a day after the first pub­lic hang­ing of the year, call[ed] for an imme­di­ate halt on all executions…

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International

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Jun 05, 2024

Worldwide Wednesday International Roundup: China, Iran, Malaysia, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, and Zimbabwe

On May 7, 2024, Harm Reduction International (HRI) released a spe­cial glob­al overview report on the use of the death penal­ty for drug offens­es, which is a vio­la­tion of inter­na­tion­al law because drug offens­es do not meet the most seri­ous” crimes thresh­old. HRI found that by the end of 2023, there were 34 coun­tries which still retained the death penal­ty for drug-relat­ed offens­es; Pakistan was the only coun­try to recent­ly elim­i­nate the death penal­ty for such offens­es – the first coun­try in more…

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May 30, 2024

Amnesty International Global Report (2023): Lowest Number of Countries Carried Out Highest Number of Recorded Executions in Nearly a Decade, Driven by Iran (74% of Total)

According to Amnesty International’s annu­al death penal­ty report for 2023, 16 coun­tries car­ried out the 1,153 known exe­cu­tions last year, con­sti­tut­ing the low­est num­ber of exe­cut­ing coun­tries on record with the orga­ni­za­tion but the high­est record­ed exe­cu­tion num­bers since 2015. The 31% glob­al increase in record­ed exe­cu­tions is attrib­ut­able to the 48% rise in exe­cu­tions in Iran (at least 853 exe­cu­tions), which account­ed for 74% of record­ed exe­cu­tions world­wide. Saudi Arabia came in sec­ond with…

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Human Rights

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International

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Oct 12, 2023

Worldwide Wednesday International Roundup: China, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, and Vietnam

October 10, 2023 marked the 21st World Day Against the Death Penalty. Regarding this year’s theme, The Death Penalty, an Irreversible Torture,” Raphaël Chenuil Hazan, exec­u­tive direc­tor of France-based abo­li­tion­ist group EPCM, said Today, we no longer need to demon­strate to any­one that the death penal­ty is a sophis­ti­cat­ed form of tor­ture, both in the phase of sen­tenc­ing or inves­ti­ga­tion (where phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal tor­ture is often used to obtain con­fes­sions), where the ele­ments of a…

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International

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May 17, 2023

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…

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International

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Time on Death Row

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Mar 20, 2023

INTERNATIONAL: Longest Serving Death Row Prisoner in the World Has Case Reversed

On March 13, 2023 in Japan, Tokyo’s High Court grant­ed a retri­al for Iwao Hakamada, a for­mer box­er known as the longest serv­ing death row” pris­on­er in the world. He was con­vict­ed of mur­der in 1968. Hideaki Nakagawa, Director of Amnesty International Japan, described the rul­ing as a long-over­due chance to deliv­er some jus­tice to…

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International

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Dec 28, 2022

Zambia Becomes 25th Sub-Saharan African Nation to Abolish Death Penalty

Fulfilling a pledge made while cam­paign­ing for office, Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema on December 23, 2022 signed leg­is­la­tion abol­ish­ing the nation’s death penal­ty (pic­tured). Zambia’s repeal of its colo­nial-era cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment law made it the 25th sub-Saharan nation in Africa to abol­ish the death penal­ty. The new law also removed the offense of crim­i­nal defama­tion of the President from Zambia’s penal…

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Human Rights

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International

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Dec 12, 2022

Iran Executes Two Prisoners Arrested in Ongoing Protests, Threatens More to Follow

In what human rights groups warn is just the start of a vio­lent cam­paign of polit­i­cal repres­sion, the Islamic Republic of Iran has begun exe­cut­ing pro­test­ers in the ongo­ing civ­il unrest fol­low­ing the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Jina Amini while in cus­tody of the government’s morality…

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International

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Dec 05, 2022

Saudi Arabia Reneges on Pledge to End Death Penalty for Drug Crimes; Execution Spree Draws Condemnation from UN and Human Rights NGOs

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and a coali­tion of more than 30 non-gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions have con­demned the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for a series of exe­cu­tions for drug crimes car­ried out in vio­la­tion of inter­na­tion­al law. Human rights orga­ni­za­tions report­ed that Saudi author­i­ties exe­cut­ed 20 men in November for drug offens­es — 12 of them for­eign nation­als — after sud­den­ly lift­ing a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions for defen­dants con­vict­ed of…

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International

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Federal Death Penalty

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Jul 11, 2022

In New Report, Amnesty International Urges President Biden to End the Federal Death Penalty and Commute All Federal Death Sentences

A new report by the human rights orga­ni­za­tion Amnesty International urges President Joe Biden to act upon his cam­paign pledge to work to abol­ish the death penal­ty by exer­cis­ing his con­sti­tu­tion­al author­i­ty to com­mute the sen­tences of all fed­er­al death row…

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International

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Jun 12, 2022

Malaysian Government Pledges to End Mandatory Death Penalty

The cab­i­net of the gov­ern­ment of Malaysia announced on June 10, 2022 that it had reached agree­ment to abol­ish the nation’s manda­to­ry death penal­ty laws and sub­mit leg­is­la­tion to par­lia­ment to pro­vide judges dis­cre­tion to impose oth­er penal­ties for cap­i­tal crimes. Law Minister Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar said the cab­i­net also agreed to study pro­pos­als to sub­sti­tute sen­tences for those cur­rent­ly on death row for offences car­ry­ing the death…

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International

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Sentencing Data

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Jun 06, 2022

Amnesty International: Mixed Global Trends on Death Penalty as More Nations Abolish and Record Few Conduct Executions, But Extreme Practices, Widespread Secrecy Reported in Outlier Nations

More coun­tries aban­doned the death penal­ty and a record low num­ber car­ried it out, but extreme prac­tices in a few out­lier nations caused glob­al exe­cu­tions to rise in 2021, accord­ing to the human rights group Amnesty…

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International

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May 23, 2022

Western Democracies, Human Rights Groups Denounce Belarus’ Use of Death Penalty to Target Political Opponents and Anti-War Activists

The U.S. State Department and the European Union have joined human rights and pro-democ­ra­cy advo­cates in con­demn­ing the expan­sion of the death penal­ty in Belarus to include non-lethal attempt­ed acts of ter­ror­ism,” call­ing the mea­sure an act of repres­sion against oppo­nents of the nation’s auto­crat­ic regime and its assis­tance to the Russian inva­sion of neighboring…

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International

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Nov 15, 2021

Death-Row Prisoners in Japan Sue Over Same-Day Notice of Executions

Two Japanese death-row pris­on­ers have filed a law­suit alleg­ing that the country’s long-crit­i­cized prac­tice of noti­fy­ing pris­on­ers of their exe­cu­tion the same day they are to be put to death is inhu­mane” and vio­lates the nation’s…

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Human Rights

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International

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Apr 21, 2021

Amnesty International Global Report: Executions Worldwide Fewest in a Decade, Death Sentences Fall More Than One Third in 2020

Fewer exe­cu­tions were car­ried out across the world in 2020 than at any time in a decade and new death sen­tences fell by more than a third, accord­ing to a new report by Amnesty International. It was the third con­sec­u­tive year in which con­firmed exe­cu­tions reached a 10-year low, and the sixth year in a row in which con­firmed exe­cu­tions declined, Amnesty…

State & Federal Info

Federal Death Penalty

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Feb 09, 2021

More Than 80 Civil Rights and Advocacy Organizations Urge President Biden to End Federal Executions

A coali­tion of 82 civ­il rights and advo­ca­cy orga­ni­za­tions have called on President Joe Biden to hon­or his cam­paign promise of ensur­ing equal­i­ty, equi­ty, and jus­tice in our crim­i­nal legal sys­tem” by tak­ing exec­u­tive action to end fed­er­al exe­cu­tions. The groups, led by The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, asked Biden to com­mute the sen­tences of every­one on fed­er­al death row, dis­man­tle the fed­er­al death cham­ber, rescind the fed­er­al execution…

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Human Rights

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International

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Youth

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Apr 25, 2019

Saudi Arabia Condemned for Mass Execution of 37 People, Including Juveniles, After Unfair Trials

In an action con­demned by the United Nations and human rights groups as a fla­grant vio­la­tion of inter­na­tion­al law, Saudi Arabia behead­ed 37 peo­ple, includ­ing juve­nile offend­ers, in six sep­a­rate loca­tions on April 23, 2019. It was the nation’s largest mass exe­cu­tion since January 2016. Most of the peo­ple exe­cut­ed were mem­bers of the Shi’a Muslim minor­i­ty com­mu­ni­ty. The human rights advo­cates blast­ed Saudi offi­cials for tar­get­ing polit­i­cal­ly dis­fa­vored groups and disregarding…

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Aug 28, 2018

Amnesty International Issues Report on the Death Penalty in Florida

A new report by Amnesty International says Floridas approach to redress­ing the near­ly 400 uncon­sti­tu­tion­al non-unan­i­mous death sen­tences imposed in the state has deep­ened its sta­tus as an out­lier on death-penal­ty issues by add[ing] an extra lay­er of arbi­trari­ness to [the state’s] already dis­crim­i­na­to­ry and error-prone cap­i­tal justice…

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International

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Apr 01, 2015

Amnesty International Reports Worldwide Decline in Executions

Executions around the world declined by 22% last year, accord­ing to Amnesty Internationals 2014 annu­al report on death sen­tences and exe­cu­tions. The report — released on April 1 — indi­cates that an esti­mat­ed 607 peo­ple were exe­cut­ed world­wide in 2014, com­pared to 778 in 2013. The glob­al totals do not include exe­cu­tions in China, where data on the death penal­ty is con­sid­ered a state secret. On a region­al lev­el, Amnesty report­ed notable declines in Sub-Saharan Africa, where…

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Human Rights

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Foreign Nationals

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Apr 01, 2003

Amnesty International: Violation of the Rights of Foreign Nationals Under Sentence of Death

More than 60 for­eign cit­i­zens rep­re­sent­ing 22 nation­al­i­ties are under sen­tence of death in the United States of America (USA). In vir­tu­al­ly every case, the arrest­ing author­i­ties failed to noti­fy detained for­eign­ers of their right to com­mu­ni­cate with their con­sular rep­re­sen­ta­tives. As a con­se­quence, for­eign nation­als con­front­ed by an unfa­mil­iar legal sys­tem were tried and sen­tenced to death with­out the ben­e­fit of the cru­cial sup­port from the author­i­ties of their native coun­tries. Since 1993,…