By Natalia Venegas / GICJ
In 2003, several NGOs established the World Day against the Death Penalty on 10 October. The purpose of this day is to remind the international community to urge all States to abolish the use of the death penalty [1]. On this occasion, GICJ reaffirms its position against this inhumane practice and calls on all States to respect their international obligations.
Life is a precious individual right. It is given equally at birth to every human being; this fundamental right is enshrined in Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: "Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person" [2]. Therefore, taking a person's life is one of the most severe violations of human rights. The crime of killing a person, however, continues to be committed by States themselves.
The death penalty violates other international human rights, such as the prohibition of torture in Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: "No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment" [3]. According to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), "the term ‘torture’ means any act by which severe pain or suffering […] is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as […] punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed” [4]. Capital punishment, by causing severe pain leading to death, clearly constitutes torture, as well as cruel and inhumane treatment. Despite international efforts to prohibit it, including instruments like the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that advocate for its abolition, the use of this practice is on the rise [5].
With regard to the abolition of the death penalty, we can see five different categories among states. As such, as of 31 December 2023, the list is as follows [6]:
- Abolitionist for all crimes: 112
- Abolitionist for ordinary crimes only: 9
- Abolitionist in practice: 23
- Total abolitionist in law or practice: 144
- Retentionist: 55.
As regarding the methods of execution, they are: beheading (Saudi Arabia), Hanging (Bangladesh, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Singapore and Syria), lethal injection (China, USA and Viet Nam), and shooting (Afghanistan, China, North Korea, Palestine, Somalia and Yemen). [7]
Death Penalty in Iran and Iraq 2024
Iran and Iraq are among the top countries that heavily use the death penalty. In 2024, UN Special Rapporteurs and experts expressed alarm over a surge in executions during August 2024 in Iran. During this month, at least 93 individuals were executed, twice as many as in July. 41 of those individuals were executed for drug offences. The experts said that the ICCPR, to which Iran is a party, restricts the application of the death penalty to the most serious crimes, so execution for drug offences violates international standards. The reported number of executions this year has risen to more than 400 individuals.[8] It is widely known that Iran is using drug offenses to eliminate and execute those opposing its policies.
Furthermore, they also called attention to the situation in Iraq. The government of Iraq has been systematically executing prisoners sentenced to death based on torture-tainted confessions and pursuing an ambiguous counterterrorism law. This amounts to arbitrary deprivation of life under international law and may amount to a crime against humanity. Since 2016, there have been around 400 executions, including 30 this year. The experts highlighted that death row prisoners are not only subjected to severe psychological pain and suffering due to the lack of information about the date of execution but also suffer other forms of ill-treatment including lack of access to adequate food and clean drinking water.[9]
GICJ is particularly concerned with unreported, illegal, and arbitrary death sentences which are happening on a daily basis under governmental orders in countries such as Iran, and Iraq. These illegal executions take place in secrecy and are therefore subject to many abuses by government officials, as warned by the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres: “secret trials, without due process, [are] increasing the potential for error or abuse” [10]. Moreover, death sentences where the practice is considered as legal is often accompanied by "far too much secrecy [...]. Although many countries are giving up the practice, those that retain it, nevertheless feel that they have something to hide” [10].
Finally, capital punishment must also be seen in its social context. It is often used as a tool of political oppression to threaten the population and ensure control by a certain government. It is also subject to clear racial and socio-economic discrimination. For example, in the United States, people of African descent are overrepresented on death row, suggesting differential court decisions and the inability of some people to afford good, expensive lawyers [11]. Finally, the irreversibility of the death penalty precludes the possibility of reversing the wrongful conviction of an innocent person.
Reaffirming that the death penalty is one of the most severe violations of human rights, Geneva International Centre for Justice (GICJ) strongly condemns this practice. As some States still legally use the death penalty, we remind these States of their international obligation and urge them to abolish it immediately. It consists of the heritage of a bygone era and has nothing to do with the world of international law and respect for human rights.
[1] https://worldcoalition.org/campagne/19th-world-day-against-the-death-penalty/
[2] https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights
[3] https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights
[4] https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Publications/FactSheet4rev.1en.pdf
[5] https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/10/1022732
[6] https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/international/executions-around-the-world
[7] https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/act50/7952/2024/en/
[8]https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/09/iran-un-experts-alarmed-surge-executions-demand-moratorium-death-penalty#:~:text=The%20International%20Covenant%20on%20Civil,standards%2C%E2%80%9D%20the%20experts%20said.
[9]https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/06/scale-and-cycle-iraqs-arbitrary-executions-may-be-crime-against-humanity
[10] https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/10/1022732
[11] https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/race
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