Death Penalty News

The EU has tightened the rules governing GSP+ trade preferences, but Pakistan’s record raises a harder question: whether Brussels is prepared to suspend market access when a major beneficiary fails to demonstrate sustained compliance with human rights, labour and governance obligations. The European Union has formally adopted revised rules for its Generalised Scheme of Preferences, strengthening the conditions attached to preferential market access for developing countries. The new framework will apply from 1 January 2027 and is intended to tighten monitoring, widen the list of international conventions, and make suspension of benefits easier in cases of serious violations.

Pakistan’s blasphemy laws are among the world’s most egregious tools of religious repression. They enable abuse, mob violence, and the targeting of individuals and religious minorities (including Christians) for criminal prosecutions that carry life sentences and death penalties.  Pakistani professor Junaid Hafeez, for instance, is imprisoned and sentenced to death for alleged blasphemy. 

Prior to Wednesday’s execution some 16 political prisoners were executed in a month, including eight from the PMOI. An Iranian opposition leader criticised European countries on Wednesday for doing too little to halt executions in Iran, after Tehran carried out another execution in what opponents say is a wartime crackdown on dissent. The judiciary’s news outlet Mizan reported on Wednesday that a man convicted of spying for Israel’s intelligence service and passing sensitive information had been executed.

Iran has reportedly carried out the execution of a man it accused of espionage for Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency. The man was executed on Wednesday, March 18, marking the first such death penalty carried out since the outbreak of the ongoing U.S.-Israeli war against Tehran. Sweden confirmed the executed individual held Swedish citizenship, prompting sharp condemnation from Stockholm and a diplomatic summons for Iran’s ambassador.

DPI’s ​“What to Know” series exam­ines cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment from mul­ti­ple angles, one top­ic at a time.  Each install­ment pro­vides essen­tial facts and data on spe­cif­ic aspects of the death penalty. Why it mat­ters : Deterrence is among the most com­mon­ly cit­ed jus­ti­fi­ca­tions for the death penal­ty, yet decades of research have failed to pro­duce cred­i­ble evi­dence that use of the death penal­ty has an impact on homicide rates. Key Facts: 88% of the nation’s lead­ing crim­i­nol­o­gists said they did not believe the death penal­ty deters homi­cides. Just 9% agreed that ​“the death penal­ty sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduces the num­ber of homicides.” When states have abol­ished the death penal­ty, mur­der rates have not fol­lowed any con­sis­tent pat­tern of change. Rates in states that for­mer­ly retained the death penal­ty fol­low nation­al trends rather than spik­ing or falling after abolition.

Pakistan’s Senate has passed legislation removing the death penalty for two specific crimes in what officials openly acknowledge is a calculated move to preserve billions in European trade benefits — while leaving untouched the blasphemy laws that have sent dozens of Christians to death row.  The Criminal Laws Amendment Bill, which awaits National Assembly approval and presidential sign-off, eliminates capital punishment for publicly stripping women and harboring hijackers. Pakistani officials did not attempt to disguise their motivation: the changes were explicitly designed to satisfy European Union requirements under the Generalized Scheme of Preferences (GSP+) trade scheme, which demands that death sentences be “limited to the most serious crimes only.”

The Belarusian democratic forces have taken an additional step toward aligning their vision of a future Belarus with European human rights standards by adopting a Memorandum on the Abolition of the Death Penalty in Belarus. The document was passed by the Coordination Council on 17 June 2025 and supported by the United Transitional Cabinet and the Office of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya.  The Memorandum demonstrates a unified commitment of the democratic forces to ending capital punishment in Belarus in all cases and under all circumstances.

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- With Japan remaining wedded to the death penalty despite a shift away from capital punishment among many developed nations, concerns linger over the diplomatic repercussions for the Asian nation as it seeks to strengthen partnerships with democracies that prioritize human rights. "Japan emphasizes that its allies are 'partners with which it shares values,' but that is often not the case at all when it comes to the death penalty," said Takako Suzuki, a 38-year-old lawmaker from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and also a former senior vice foreign minister.

After it intersected with his job as an anesthesiologist, Dr. Joel Zivot devoted years to studying the death penalty. Now, he's concerned about a new form of execution, nitrogen hypoxia, which was used in Alabama for the first time in January. Dr. Joel Zivot first began researching the death penalty 12 years ago when it suddenly affected his day job. As an anesthesiologist in the ICU at Emory University Hospital, Zivot frequently used the drug sodium thiopental. But in 2011, the drug disappeared from the market and caused a drastic shortage in ICUs across the country. When Zivot looked into the cause of the shortage, he found the drug was pulled by manufacturer Hospira after they couldn’t promise the European Union—who threatened to ban the export of lethal injection drugs—that sodium thiopental wasn’t used for executions. “I felt outraged that this drug I used to heal could also be involved in [lethal injection],” says Zivot.

As trial wraps up in Tehran, prosecutor says Johan Floderus charged with ‘very extensive intelligence cooperation with the Zionist occupation regime’ The trial of a Swedish EU diplomat wrapped up in Tehran on Sunday, with Iranian prosecutors seeking the maximum penalty for the man accused of spying for Israel. The prosecutor said that 33-year-old Johan Floderus — who works for the European Union diplomatic service — was charged with “very extensive intelligence cooperation with the Zionist occupation regime,” meaning Israel, according to the judiciary’s Mizan Online website.

Italian, Spanish Super Cups Played in Riyadh to Divert Attention From Abuses Forget Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist brutally murdered in a Saudi consulate, and all his colleagues jailed, censored or harassed in Saudi Arabia; don’t think about women’s and LGBT rights in the kingdom; and ignore the mass killings of migrants along the Saudi border with Yemen. Look, there, Saudi Arabia is hosting the Super Cup, Inter Milan, Real Madrid! It’s the country of Cristiano Ronaldo and Neymar, not repression and rampant human rights abuses.

Hideo Hiraoka has not forgotten the barbs and sneers directed his way over his cautious stance toward ordering death penalties when he was justice minister. More than a decade after leaving that post, Hiraoka was offended by another comment concerning capital punishment. Yasuhiro Hanashi was forced to resign as justice minister in November last year after he jokingly said that he served in a “low-profile position that makes headlines only when the minister has stamped an order for executing a death penalty.”

Johan Floderus faces trial for ‘spying for Israel’ and ‘corruption on Earth’, one of Iran’s most serious offences Iran has accused a Swedish EU diplomat held in a Tehran prison for more than 600 days of spying for Israel and “corruption on Earth”, a crime that carries the death penalty. “Johan Floderus is accused of extensive measures against the security of the country, extensive intelligence cooperation with the Zionist regime and corruption on Earth,” the judiciary’s Mizan Online news agency said on Sunday.

A new report by a human rights group which closely follows how many prisoners are executed in Iran each month offers a chilling look at the surge in capital punishment there. The Hengaw Organization for Human Rights has documented at least 100 executions in Iran over the past month, indicating a stark increase of more than 50% in comparison to the previous month. In a report released Saturday, Hengaw disclosed a notable surge of 56.5% in the number of executions during November, recording 122 compared to the 78 reported in October.

The Permanent Representative of Armenia to the Council of Europe, Ambassador Arman Khachatryan, in the presence of Secretary General Marija Pejčinović Burić, has deposited the ratification instrument, thereby completing the process of ratification by Armenia of Protocol No. 13 to the European Convention on Human Rights, which represents the abolition of the death penalty in all circumstances.

Today [Oct. 10] is the 21st World Day against the Death Penalty, and a pathway towards abolition of this cruel measure in the South East Asia is not unimaginable. I don’t pen these words in response to vast mobilizations against capital punishment sweeping the region. Quite the contrary. Regrettably, we’re far from achieving that level of awareness and mobilization. This is a region where championing human rights hasn’t historically been viewed as fashionable or commendable. Yet, there’s a genuine opportunity to ignite a substantive conversation about the death penalty.

MEDICAL EQUIPMENT MANUFACTURERS are refusing to sell their products for use in lethal injection, The Intercept has learned. The stance could further hinder states’ ability to carry out death sentences at a time when similar restrictions have limited access to drugs. The four companies that have raised objections are Baxter International Inc., B. Braun Medical Inc., Fresenius Kabi, and Johnson & Johnson. In addition to manufacturing drugs, they make IV catheters, syringes, medical tubing, and IV bags, products states rely on to administer lethal injection. In statements to The Intercept, the companies said that the use of their equipment in executions contradicts their values.

Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko is as complicit in crimes of aggression against Ukraine as Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is, the European Parliament asserted in a resolution adopted on Sept. 13. The resolution, based on a report by MEP Petras Austrevičius from Lithuania, was adopted during a plenary session in Strasbourg by an overwhelming majority of votes. “The illegitimate Lukashenka regime is actively supporting and has become fully complicit in Russia’s unjustified war of aggression and war crimes against Ukraine,” the document reads. “The special international tribunal on the crime of aggression perpetrated by Russia against Ukraine must have jurisdiction to investigate not only Putin and the Russian political and military leadership, but also the Belarusian leadership.”

The blind eye turned by the Commission to Uganda contrasts with Brussels’ dogged pursuit of Hungary and Poland for alleged homophobia. The European Commission confirmed this week that it will not suspend humanitarian aid to Uganda despite the East African nation’s criminalisation of homosexuality. Under the new law, practicing homosexuality can result in punishment up to the point of the death penalty, as part of a cultural pivot away from the West by President Museveni. The Commission was responding to a parliamentary question by conservative Swedish Democrat MEP Johan Nissinen concerning approximately €248 million in aid that Uganda has received from the EU since 2017, most recently to combat the spread of Ebola.

The New Year's Day edition of The Korea Herald in 1998 depicted the somber image of a nation grappling with a financial crisis, teetering on the edge of uncertainty and reliant on a bailout package from the International Monetary Fund. While delivering the dim outlook for the year ahead, the paper also published a 74-word article at the bottom of page 3 with the headline, “23 death-row inmates executed.” The story told of how, two days earlier on Dec. 30, 1997, the government had hanged the nearly two dozen death-row inmates in order to “show a resolute stand against crime." It was the first time they had executed anyone on death row since November 1995.