Death penalty: Executions surge in 2022, the highest number recorded in the past five years

ROME – The Middle East and North Africa lead Amnesty International’s dramatic ranking of countries that still sentence to death. In these two portions of the world, executions increased from 520 in 2021 to 825 in 2022. A total of 883 people were executed in twenty countries of the world, marking an increase of 53 percent compared to 2021. However, these are low figures which do not take into account the thousands who were executed last year in China.

The countries that condemn the most. 90 percent of the executions, leaving aside China on which there is no certain data, were carried out by only three countries: Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. In Iran, death sentences increased from 314 in 2021 to 576 in 2022. The figure tripled in Saudi Arabia, where they rose from 65 in 2021 to 196 in 2022 – the highest figure recorded by Amnesty in thirty years. Egypt executed 24 people. “The countries of the Middle East and North Africa have violated international law by increasing the number of executions in 2022, with evident contempt for human life” denounces Agnès Callamard, secretary general of Amnesty International. Similarly Iran, in a desperate attempt to end popular demonstrations after the death of Mahsa Amini, has executed people simply for exercising the right to protest.

Uncertain data. Exact numbers executed in countries such as China, North Korea and Vietnam, which are known to routinely use the death penalty, are not known. This means that the real global figure of people convicted is much higher than that reported by Amnesty International. But however uncertain the figures may be, according to the organization, China remains the toughest state in applying the death sentence, ahead of Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United States.

Five countries resumed executions. Afghanistan, Kuwait, Myanmar, Palestine and Singapore have started executing again. While an increase in executions was also recorded in the United States: from 11 in 2021 to 18 in 2022. In this general context, the number of people executed for drug-related crimes has doubled.

Execute for drugs. Drug-related executions account for 37 per cent of global executions and violate international human rights law, according to which the death penalty should be applied only to the most serious offences. The countries that most of all resort to this punishment for drug-related offenses are China, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Singapore. According to Amnesty, Vietnam is also likely to sentence people to death for drug-related crimes, but at the moment the figures are a state secret.

Poverty and capital punishment. Agnès Callamard points out that it is often people from disadvantaged backgrounds who are disproportionately affected by this inhumane punishment. For Amnesty the United Nations should increase pressure on the countries responsible for these blatant human rights violations. The latest data concerns the death sentences which instead recorded a very slight decrease, going from 2052 in 2021 to 2016 in 2022.

The hope of abolitionist countries. In this gloomy scenario, a glimmer of hope has come from six countries that have abolished the death penalty in whole or in part. Kazakhstan, Papua New Guinea, Sierra Leone and the Central African Republic have abolished the death penalty for all crimes, while Equatorial Guinea and Zambia have abolished only ordinary crimes. As of December 2022, 112 countries had eliminated executions for all crimes and nine countries for just ordinary ones. The positive wave has involved Liberia and Ghana, which have adopted legislative measures for the abolition, while the authorities of Sri Lanka and the Maldives have said they will not apply the death sentences. Bills to repeal the mandatory death penalty have also been introduced in the Malaysian parliament.

The moratorium. In December 2022 there was a historic vote in the United Nations General Assembly, where 125 countries voted in favor of a universal moratorium on capital punishment. The United States voted against, along with Iran, China, Vietnam, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and 30 other states, while 22 abstained. Support for a global moratorium on executions surpassed the previous record of 120 countries in favor achieved in 2018 and confirmed in 2020. “With 125 UN member states calling for a moratorium on executions, Amnesty International she is confident that this aberrant punishment will soon be relegated to the annals of history,” comments Agnès Callamard. For which, however, the tragic numbers of 2022 remind us that we must continue to campaign until the death penalty is abolished worldwide.