All about Gambia

On 28 September 2018, during the UN Treaty Event in New York, Gambia ratified the Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR, aiming at the irreversible abolition of the death penalty, alongside the Convention Against Torture.

From November 1st to November 15, 2017, the 61st session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, as well as the NGO Forum, took place in Banjul, Gambia. During the opening session, the President of The Gambia, Adama Barrow, confirmed the “New Gambia’s commitment” to human rights.

on 20 and 21 September 2017, Gambia signed and Madagascar ratified the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty.

At the end of October, the civil society gathered for the NGO Forum preceding the 59th African Commission for Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR): an occasion to put the death penalty on the agenda of the African Commission and to make the calls for the abolition heard. Nonetheless, difficulties on the path towards the abolition in the African continent remain.

During the 58th Extraordinary Session of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR), the Working Group of the ACHPR on the death penalty in Africa, in partnership with the World Coalition, the FIACAT and the FIDH, organized a panel discussion about the death penalty in Africa, on April 16, 2016.

At least 682 people were executed last year aside from China, according to Amnesty International.

FIDH and the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty join others to urge The Gambia to stop executions and call upon the African Union to relocate the seat of the African Commission for Human and People’s Rights in another country.

The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights met in Banjul between November 10-24. A group of abolitionist organisations took part in the conference.