The University of Oxford Death Penalty Research Unit, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with sev­er­al human rights non­prof­its, recent­ly launched a data­base of for­eign nation­als sen­tenced to death or exe­cut­ed from January 1, 2016 to December 31, 2021 in Asia and the Middle East. They found that Saudi Arabia leads the Middle East in sen­tenc­ing for­eign nation­als to death (385 peo­ple) and drug-traf­fick­ing (283), close­ly fol­lowed by mur­der (257), are the top crimes for which for­eign nation­als in the region are cap­i­tal­ly con­vict­ed. Among the for­eign nation­als sen­tenced to the death in the Middle East, Pakistani (155) is the most com­mon nation­al­i­ty and labor­er (254) is the most com­mon occu­pa­tion. Indonesia leads Asia in sen­tenc­ing for­eign nation­als to death (142 peo­ple) and drug-traf­fick­ing (338) is the main crime for which peo­ple are cap­i­tal­ly con­vict­ed. In Asia, Laborer (44) fol­lowed by Retail/​Hospitality (35), is the main occu­pa­tion of for­eign nation­als exe­cut­ed and most for­eign nation­als (269) are await­ing exe­cu­tion; in the Middle East, 379 peo­ple have already been exe­cut­ed and 215 peo­ple are await­ing execution. 

China 

On December 10, 2023, in hon­or of International Human Rights Day, the European Union Delegation in China issued a state­ment high­light­ing prob­lem­at­ic areas of China’s human rights record, includ­ing its reten­tion and appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty. Although data about the num­ber of death sen­tences and exe­cu­tions is a state secret, the esti­mat­ed num­ber of death sen­tences and exe­cu­tions in China exceeds by far that of all oth­er coun­tries tak­en togeth­er,” said the state­ment. The EU calls upon China to pro­vide more trans­paren­cy in the appli­ca­tion and impo­si­tion of the death penal­ty and to fur­ther reduce the num­ber of crim­i­nal offens­es pun­ish­able by death.” Maintaining its posi­tion on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, the EU reaf­firms that the death penal­ty remains an inef­fec­tive, unnec­es­sary and irrev­o­ca­ble pun­ish­ment, and there­fore urges China to intro­duce a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions and ulti­mate­ly abol­ish this inhu­man prac­tice.” 

On December 18, 2023, Lao Rongzhi, a woman con­vict­ed of rob­bery, extor­tion, and the mur­der of sev­en peo­ple between 1996 and 1999, was exe­cut­ed. Ms. Rongzhi, who evad­ed arrest for 20 years, alleged­ly tar­get­ed vic­tims at enter­tain­ment venues and her then-boyfriend, Fa Ziying, killed them. 

Indonesia 

On December 5, 2023, Medan District Court in North Sumatra sen­tenced 60-year-old Wardani Ibrahim to death for trans­port­ing 43 kilo­grams of crys­tal metham­phet­a­mine. The judge high­light­ed how the defendant’s actions hin­dered government’s efforts to elim­i­nate nar­cotics dis­tri­b­u­tion and endan­gered the younger gen­er­a­tion; the judge found no mit­i­gat­ing fac­tors in Mr. Wardani’s case, who was charged under the 2009 Narcotics Law. 

Iran 

There have so far been at least 52 exe­cu­tions in 2024, accord­ing to Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO). On January 23, 23-year-old Mohammad Ghobadlou was exe­cut­ed in Karaj. Mr. Ghobadlou was sen­tenced to death both in the Revolutionary Courts and the Criminal Courts for run­ning over and killing an offi­cial dur­ing Woman, Life, Freedom” protests in 2022 – he is at least the ninth Woman, Life, Freedom” pro­test­er to have been exe­cut­ed. According to Amnesty International, Mr. Ghobadlou has been under psy­chi­atric care for bipo­lar dis­or­der since the age of 15 and for the first month of deten­tion was denied his med­ica­tion, as well as access to his lawyer. Farhad Salimi, a Kurdish-Sunni polit­i­cal pris­on­er, was also exe­cut­ed on January 23 in Karaj; Mr. Salimi, who was on hunger strike at the time of exe­cu­tion, was arrest­ed in 2010, along with six oth­ers. The sev­en defen­dants were phys­i­cal­ly and psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly tor­tured to extract forced con­fes­sions,” accord­ing to IHRNGO. Four of the defen­dants have been exe­cut­ed – two were exe­cut­ed in November 2023, while Davoud Abdolllahi (exe­cut­ed January 2) and Mr. Salimi were exe­cut­ed in January 2024 – and IHRNGO warns that the remain­ing three are at grave risk.” 

The judiciary’s Mizan Online news agency announced on December 10, 2023 that the tri­al of 33-year-old Swedish European Union employ­ee Johan Floderus, accused of espi­onage for Israel and cor­rup­tion on earth,” had begun. Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has called for Mr. Floderus’ release and said the charges were com­plete­ly with­out fac­tu­al basis,” as has the European Union’s diplo­mat­ic ser­vice. An offi­cial spokesper­son for the European Union stat­ed: We are seek­ing clar­i­fi­ca­tion and more infor­ma­tion from them in close coor­di­na­tion with the Swedish author­i­ties who bear the con­sular respon­si­bil­i­ty. The European Union will con­tin­ue to work tire­less­ly to secure the release of our col­league Johan and that of oth­er EU nation­als … who are arbi­trar­i­ly detained.”  

Mr. Floderus’ father told The Guardian of the unac­cept­able” con­di­tions of con­fine­ment in which his son has been kept for more than 600 days. Mr. Floderus’ has been held in a con­tin­u­ous­ly lit shared cell with no bed and has not been grant­ed rou­tine con­sular vis­its or phone calls. There have been calls on approx­i­mate­ly 15 days and at least five of these have been allowed after he went on hunger strike,” said Mr. Floderus’ father. Mr. Floderus was orig­i­nal­ly detained in April 2022 dur­ing Sweden’s his­toric tri­al of for­mer Iranian offi­cial Hamid Noury for his involve­ment in the 1988 sum­mer mas­sacres, when at least 5,000 dis­si­dents were exe­cut­ed, accord­ing to 2018 num­bers from Amnesty International. Under the uni­ver­sal juris­dic­tion prin­ci­pal, Sweden pros­e­cut­ed Mr. Noury, who was con­vict­ed for grave breach­es of inter­na­tion­al human­i­tar­i­an law and mur­der” in July 2022 and sen­tenced to life in prison. On December 19, the Svea Court of Appeal upheld Mr. Noury’s sen­tence. While sev­er­al hun­dred pro­test­ers out­side the court cel­e­brat­ed the deci­sion, Mr. Noury’s son told the Iran’s Fars news agency we will go to high­er Swedish courts as well as inter­na­tion­al courts and present our evi­dence.” 

According to Mizan, an unnamed man was exe­cut­ed in Zahedan Central Prison on December 16, 2023 for links with for­eign ser­vices includ­ing Mossad.” He was con­vict­ed of intel­li­gence coop­er­a­tion and espi­onage for the ben­e­fit for the hos­tile Zionist regime [Israel]” and col­lect­ing and pro­vid­ing clas­si­fied infor­ma­tion to the Mossad spy ser­vice with the aim of dis­rupt­ing pub­lic order,” accord­ing to France24. On December 29, 2023, Iran exe­cut­ed three men and one woman for links to Mossad; they were charged with kid­nap­ping Iranian secu­ri­ty forces and accused of set­ting the cars and homes of some agents on fire. 

In a December 21, 2023 video inter­view, mem­ber of par­lia­ment Yahya Ebrahimi raised con­cern over the immi­nent exe­cu­tion of thou­sands in a coun­ty with a pop­u­la­tion of 144,000. Mr. Ebrahimi said: 1000 to 2000 young peo­ple in Delfan coun­ty have unfor­tu­nate­ly been sen­tenced to death for sell­ing drugs and their cas­es are at the imple­men­ta­tion stage.” Upon pub­li­ca­tion of the inter­view, Mr. Ebrahimi retract­ed his state­ment, say­ing the infor­ma­tion he received was false. 

Israel 

The Constitution, Law and Justice Committee of the Knesset, or par­lia­ment, held a closed door ses­sion to dis­cuss leg­is­la­tion man­dat­ing the death penal­ty for those con­vict­ed of ter­ror­ism, despite push­back from rel­a­tives of hostages held by Hamas dur­ing par­lia­men­tary dis­cus­sions in November. The next day, Knesset mem­ber (KM) Ariel Kallner of the Likud par­ty con­firmed that the death penal­ty remains an option for those involved in the October 7 attack, accord­ing to the Jerusalem Post. Our pri­ma­ry goal is to ensure their con­vic­tion. The sys­tem swift­ly adjust­ed itself to com­bat these inhu­man mon­sters. As Knesset mem­bers, we ful­ly sup­port this effort,” said KM Kallner. We hope that the High Court of Justice judges also com­pre­hend the grav­i­ty of the sit­u­a­tion.” 

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who advanced the pro­pos­al last month, reit­er­at­ed calls for exe­cut­ing impris­oned mem­bers of Hamas, tweet­ing: he death penal­ty must be applied against the ter­ror­ists. Prisoners from elite Hamas forces must be exe­cut­ed for each day that pass­es in which the kid­napped are not released.” 

Japan 

On January 18, the Kofu District Court sen­tenced 21-year-old Endo Yuki to death on mur­der and arson charges for killing the par­ents of female class­mate who reject­ed his roman­tic advances in 2021. Mr. Endo, who com­mit­ted the crime at age 19, is the first per­son sen­tenced to death for a com­mit­ting a crime when age 18 or 19 under the new­ly revised juve­nile law in 2022 low­ered the legal age of adult­hood from 20 to 18. Presiding Judge Jun Mikami said that the defendant’s age is not a rea­son to avoid the death penal­ty.” 

On December 8, 2023 five judges on the Supreme Court’s Third Petty Bench unan­i­mous­ly upheld the death sen­tence of for­mer police­man, Mitsuru Nakata. Mr. Nakata was con­vict­ed of mur­der­ing his wife, age 38, and two chil­dren, aged nine and six, in 2017. According to Kyodo News, Presiding Judge Yasumasa Nagamine com­ment­ed that Mr. Nakata’s dis­re­gard for human life was extreme, based on his deter­mined and strong inten­tion to kill” and high­light­ed his lack of remorse. 

Pakistan 

The Islamabad District and Sessions Court sen­tenced Shahnawaz Amir to death and imposed a penal­ty of $1million rupees on December 14. Mr. Amir was con­vict­ed on December 9 of mur­der­ing his 37-year-old Canadian-Pakistani wife, Sarah Inman, at their farm­house in November 2022 

Qatar 

On December 28, 2023, the Court of Appeal of Qatar dropped the death sen­tence against eight Indian for­mer naval offi­cers, who were orig­i­nal­ly sen­tenced in October on charges of espi­onage. Although the court orders have not been made pub­lic, Indian for­eign min­istry spokesper­son Randhir Jaiswal said in a press brief­ing: What we can tell you, con­firm to you is, that the death penal­ty has now been con­vert­ed into vary­ing prison sen­tences for the eight Indian nation­als.” 

Saudi Arabia 

In 2023, the offi­cial news agency report­ed that, accord­ing to the Ministry of the Interior, 172 exe­cu­tions were car­ried out, mark­ing a 15% increase from the offi­cial fig­ure report­ed in 2022; as the cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem still lacks trans­paren­cy, the actu­al fig­ure of exe­cu­tions is like­ly to be high­er, accord­ing to the Saudi European Organisation for Human Rights (ESOHR). The high­est num­ber of exe­cu­tions took place in the month of December (42) and unprece­dent­ed exe­cu­tions were car­ried out dur­ing the holy month of Ramadan. 70% of exe­cu­tions were for charges not meet­ing the inter­na­tion­al thresh­old of a most-seri­ous” offense and com­mon unfair tri­al prac­tices includ­ed tor­ture, ill-treat­ment, and the denial of the right to ade­quate self-defense. According to the ESOHR, the per­cent­age of dis­cre­tionary death sen­tences from the total exe­cu­tions decreased in 2023 com­pared to the pre­vi­ous 11 years by approx­i­mate­ly 16%. ESOHR high­lights that suc­ces­sive offi­cial promis­es, affirm­ing that reduc­ing dis­cre­tionary death sen­tences would con­tribute to an over­all reduc­tion in exe­cu­tion num­bers, demon­strate the inef­fec­tive­ness of these assur­ances.” 

Taiwan 

On December 7, 2023, Taiwan High Court’s Taichung Branch Court upheld the Nantou District Court’s death sen­tence and life-long sus­pen­sion of civ­il rights for Lee Hung-yuan. In its rul­ing, the Taichung Branch Court point­ed to the Taiwan Forensic Psychology Association’s foren­sic psy­chi­atric exam­i­na­tion that deter­mined the unlike­li­hood of Mr. Lee’s reha­bil­i­ta­tion and iden­ti­fied the crime as a most seri­ous crime” under inter­na­tion­al law. Mr. Lee, who is able to appeal the deci­sion, was con­vict­ed of shoot­ing five employ­ees, result­ing in four dead and one crit­i­cal­ly injured, at a biotech­nol­o­gy com­pa­ny at which he used to work. 

Yemen 

On December 5, 35-year-old Fatema Saleh al-Arwali, child and women human rights activist and for­mer head of the Yemeni office of the Arab League’s Arab Women Leadership Council, was sen­tenced to death by the Specialized Criminal Prosecution in Houthi-con­trolled Sanaa on espi­onage charges. Ms. al-Arawali was arrest­ed in August 2022, short­ly after return­ing from vis­it­ing her fam­i­ly in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and accused of pro­vid­ing the UAE with intel­li­gence. 

Dozens of local activists, lawyers, and aca­d­e­mics signed a peti­tion con­demn­ing the denial of legal rep­re­sen­ta­tion dur­ing Ms. al-Arawali’s first tri­al, inhu­mane deten­tion in a light­less under­ground cell and urged her release. We urge that the death sen­tence imposed on her be over­turned. We urge human rights and civ­il soci­ety groups to unite in oppo­si­tion to this unfair sen­tenc­ing that under­mines jus­tice,” said the peti­tion. 

International orga­ni­za­tions, such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and SAM Organization for Rights and Liberties have crit­i­cized the sen­tence and urged her release. Human Rights Watch Yemen and Bahrain researcher, Niku Jafarnia, said Repression of human rights defend­ers and women’s rights activists in Houthi-con­trolled ter­ri­to­ries is reach­ing ter­ri­fy­ing new lev­els. Instead of pro­vid­ing peo­ple in their ter­ri­to­ry with basic neces­si­ties such as food and water, the Houthis are sup­press­ing human rights and free­doms.” 

Citation Guide
Sources

Foreign Nationals on Death Row, University of Oxford Death Penalty Research Unit 

China 

Statement of the EU Delegation to China on the International Human Rights Day 2023, Delegation of the European Union to the People’s Republic of China, December 102023

Indonesia 

Apriadi Gunawan, Medan court hands death penal­ty to 60-year-old meth mule, Jakarta Post, December 82023

Iran 

Kurdish Political Prisoner Farhad Salimi Executed After 14 Years; Co-Defendants at Grave Risk, IRHNGO, January 23, 2024; Protester Mohammad Ghobadlu Executed in Karaj, IRHNGO, January 23, 2024; Adam Pourahmadi, Iran exe­cutes pro­test­er with men­tal health con­di­tion, judi­cia­ry says, CNN, January 23, 2024; Iran: Youth with men­tal dis­abil­i­ty risks exe­cu­tion: Mohammad Ghobadlou, Amnesty International, January 20, 2024; Johan Ahlander and Simon Johnson, Swedish court upholds life sen­tence in Iran exe­cu­tions case, Reuters, December 19, 2023; Swedish court con­firms life sen­tence for Iran ex-prison offi­cial, France24, December 19, 2023; Iran begins tri­al of Swedish EU employ­ee accused of spy­ing for Israel’, Al Jazeera, December 10, 2023; Lisa O’Carroll, Levels of hell’: Father of Swedish EU diplo­mat calls for his release by Iran, The Guardian, December 8, 2023; Agence France-Presse in Tehran, Iran accus­es Swedish EU diplo­mat of crime that car­ries the death penal­ty, The Guardian, December 11, 2023; Miranda Bryant and Lisa O’Carroll, Sweden demands imme­di­ate release of EU diplo­mat from Iran jail, The Guardian, December 11, 2023; IHRNGO Warns of More Drug Executions; 1000+ Awaiting Gallows in One City According to MP, Iran Human RIghts, December 21, 2023; IHRNGO Warns of Hike in Executions over Christmas; Samira Sabzian at Risk of Execution, Iran Human Rights, December 16, 2023; News Wires, Iran exe­cutes Mossad agent’ con­vict­ed of spy­ing for Israel, France24, December 16, 2023; Iran says it exe­cutes four peo­ple accused of links to Israel’s Mossad, Al Jazeera, December 292023 

Israel 

Hamas ter­ror­ists’ pros­e­cu­tion: Is the death penal­ty on the table?, The Jerusalem Post, December 21, 2023; Kill a detained Hamas mem­ber each day Israeli hostages are held, Ben-Gvir says, Middle East Monitor, December 192023 

Japan 

Japan court sen­tences man to death for mur­der, arson com­mit­ted when he was 19, NHK World-Japan, January 18, 2024; YUKANA INOUE AND KANAKO TAKAHARA, In first, spec­i­fied juve­nile’ hand­ed death sen­tence over Kofu mur­der, Japan Times, January 18, 2024; Ex-cop’s appeal over mur­der of fam­i­ly dis­missed, death penal­ty upheld, Kyodo News, December 82023 

Pakistan 

ASLAM KHOKHAR, Shahnawaz Amir gets death penal­ty in wife Sarah Inam’s mur­der case, Samaa, December 14, 2023; Houthi Court’s Verdict to Execute Activist Fatima Al-Arwali Mocks Justice, SAM, December 6, 2023; Rizwan Yousufzai, Sarah Inam mur­der case: Court hands death sen­tence to Shahnawaz Amir, December 142023 

Qatar 

Qatar court drops death sen­tence for eight Indians, New Delhi says, Reuters, December 28, 2023; Meryl Sebastian, Qatar: Indian ex-naval offi­cers get vary­ing’ jail terms, BBC, January 52023 

Saudi Arabia 

Execution in Saudi Arabia 2023: Ongoing Bloodshed with Unusual Sentences, ESOHR, January 222024 

Taiwan 

Flor Wang and Hao Hsueh-chin, Death penal­ty upheld in exe­cu­tion-style shoot­ing of 5 in Nantou, Focus Taiwan CNA English News, December 72023

Yemen 

SAEED AL-BATATI, Houthi court sen­tences Yemeni women’s rights activist to death, Arab News, December 6, 2023; Yemen: Houthis Sentence Woman to Death, Human Rights Watch, December 192023