AI: China continues to lead world in executions News
AI: China continues to lead world in executions

Amnesty International (AI) [advocacy website] released [press release] its annual report [text, PDF] on global use of the death penalty Tuesday, saying China continues to use the punishment more than any other country. The group says the exact number of executions committed in China in 2016 cannot be known for certain because China labels information related to executions as a state secret. AI estimates that the total number of executions in China were in the thousands for 2016. Iran is second in the world, committing at least 567 executions in 2016. Not including data from China, there were at least 1,032 executions throughout the world in 2016, which is over 600 executions less than 2015. The number of people sentenced to death in 2016, however, was 3,117, which is an increase of more than 1,000 compared to 2015. The United States fell out of the top five list for the first time since 2006. A total of 20 executions occurred in the US in 2016, nine of which occurred in Georgia and seven occurred in Texas. Thirty-two people were given death sentences in 2016 in the US, resulting in a total of 2,832 people being on death row in the country.

The use of the death penalty [JURIST op-ed] within the United States has been a highly contested punishment. In March, Florida enacted [JURIST report] a law which required a unanimous recommendation from the jury in order to impose a death sentence. Earlier in March, the Arkansas Supreme Court [official website] issued an order [JURIST report] stating there is no stay in place preventing the execution of eight inmates schedule for next month. In February the Mississippi house approved a bill [JURIST report] allowing firing squad executions. Also in February a judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of Ohio refused to lift [JURIST report] a preliminary injunction that delays executions in Ohio. In January Judge Michael Merz blocked [JURIST report] Ohio’s lethal injection protocol by deeming it unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment. Also in January the US Supreme Court refused [JURIST report] to consider a challenge to Alabama’s death penalty system.