UN Experts: ‘Almost Impossible’ for Countries to Administer Death Penalty without Violating Defendants’ Human Rights

From [HERE] Two leading United Nations human rights experts have condemned capital punishment as incompatible with international legal requirements, saying the death penalty is “almost impossible” to administer while respecting the human rights of the accused.

In a joint statement issued from Geneva, Switzerland on Oct. 10, 2022 in connection with the observance of the 20th World Day Against the Death Penalty, Dr. Alice Jill Edwards, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and Morris Tidball-Binz, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions called death-penalty abolition “the only viable path.” “Although the death penalty is permitted in very limited circumstances under international law, the reality remains that in practice it is almost impossible for States to impose capital punishment while meeting their obligations to respect the human rights of those convicted,” they said.

The Special Rapporteurs criticized death-row conditions, torturous execution methods, and the use of capital punishment against vulnerable classes of defendants and as an instrument of political oppression. “A number of states continue to impose the death penalty for non-violent crimes such as blasphemy, adultery and drug-related offences, which fail the ‘most serious crime’ standard for the application of capital punishment under international law. A growing trend of imposing the death penalty on those exercising their right to peaceful political protest is deeply worrying,” they wrote.