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“Extraordinary things can happen to ordinary people and still be OK »The Sunny Center is a place like no other place in the world. Perched on the top of a hill, it is surrounded by lakes and hills that multiply as far as the eye can see. The landscape is breath-taking. But the landscape is nothing compared to the founders of the Sunny Center. Sunny Jacobs, 72, and Peter Pringle, soon 80, began welcoming innocent people into their homes in 2011.

As the worldwide trend towards abolition of the death penalty grows, the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty notes with concerns that the USA has reached a total of 1500 executions since 1977.

So said Raphael Chenuil Hazan, director of ECPM, at the opening ceremony of the Asian Regional Congress in Kuala Lumpur.

A World Coalition delegation found the door closed on June 16 when they attempted to handover to the Chinese Liaison Office in Hong Kong a petition urging for changes in the death penalty system in China.

As Kazakhstan’s authorities prepare to introduce a new penal code, World Coalition members are warning against attempts to broaden the offences punishable by death.

The majority of executions take place in Asia. But this is also the continent where campaigners have developed a fantastic regional abolitionist network, one that reaches across borders, languages and religions.

The testimony of an exonerated death row prisoners helped international students overcome initial awkwardness and launch into passionate debates at the invitation of Paris-based organisations on World Day Against the Death Penalty.

US-based World Coalition member Journey of Hope answers the call to tour Uganda and strengthen the fight against the death penalty in the country.

Twelve governments from countries with and without capital punishment release a joint declaration calling for a world that “respects human dignity” on World Day Against the Death Penalty.

World Coalition members RAL, FIACAT and FIDH took part in this month’s 55th Session of the African Commission of Human and People’s Rights in Luanda, Angola, which included the periodic review of the situation in Liberia.

The abolition of the capital punishment figured prominently at the 49th session of the African Commission of Human and People’s Rights.

The World Coalition and its members call on UNODC to stop support to Iran as executions for drug trafficking surge.

A report published by the Death Penalty Project and the Center for Prisoners’ Rights shows that Japanese law and practice on capital punishment violate international treaties, and questions the high level of public support for the death penalty reported by the authorities.

The Federation of Liberal Students (FEL), a Belgian political organisation, has just joined the World Coalition. FEL president Arnaud Van Praet explains his organisation’s mobilisation against capital punishment.

Belgium and the United Nations’ human rights office have held a panel discussion to promote efforts in favour of the strongest international instrument against capital punishment.

The World Coalition Against the Death Penalty has announced its June annual general assembly at a press conference in Rabat, Morocco.

On September 24th, the UN Permanent Mission of Italy, the European Union, and Amnesty International, in cooperation with the UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights (OHCHR) and UN Women, held a high-level virtual event that shed light on the gender dimension of the death penalty. The webinar was conducted as part of […]

Shaken up by revolutions and conflicts, the southern shores of the Mediterranean are more than ever enticed for abolition – but opposition is fierce.

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.

Hundreds of Ugandan death row inmates and those who support them are awaiting a final decision in the constitutional case they have taken against the death penalty in their country.

On 18 June 2018, the Korean National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) called on the South Korean President to declare an official moratorium on the death penalty to mark the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on December 10.

February was a month of intense strategising for members of the regional coalition against the death penalty as well as region’s ACATs, as two meetings convened to discuss the best options to spur on Africa’s march towards abolition.

In the context of the new project to increase mobilization towards the abolition of the death penalty in Africa, from 15 to 19 April 2016 the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty has been engaged in several important activities in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.Tanzania is a country that still retains the death penalty in its laws though it is abolitionist in practice, the last execution took place in 1994.

The Paris Bar Association (a World Coalition member) and its Beirut counterpart have called on lawyers worldwide to increase efforts to defend those facing the death penalty and to push for its abolition.

On 12 April 2022, Rescue Alternatives Liberia (RAL) orchestrated a one-day forum on abolition in Liberia with the support of the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty. The outcomes of this event were very promising, and time will tell if abolition in Liberia is near.

World Coalition member Amnesty International has released its annual statistics on the death penalty and launched a campaign against capital punishment in Belarus.

On 17, 20 and 27 November, the Australian Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs is conducting public hearings on Australia’s advocacy for the abolition of the death penalty. The World Coalition and its members uses this opportunity to make their voices heard.

Kenya is one of a few target countries for the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty’s “Gender and the Death Penalty” campaign; a campaign that is being conducted in collaboration with its member organisations in the country, namely the Kenyan Section of the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ Kenya) and the Kenya Human Rights Commission.

8th September 2011 marks the 5,000th day without executions in South Korea. Houng-oh Kim, a member of the National Assembly and former Speaker, is aiming to introduce a new bill abolishing the death penalty to mark this occasion.

Participants to the meeting held by FIACAT in Senegal mid-November received training on regional abolitionist activism and set priorities for their actions.

The Paris Bar and AJEM, two World Coalition member organisations, have been joining forces to defend national and international arguments for abolition in Lebanon.

International abolitionists gathered on the Caribbean territory to promote their message and to show solidarity with the local authorities against capital punishment.

Two World Coalition members, Avocats Sans Frontières France and the Paris Bar Association, held a conference on the death penalty in Nigeria in Paris on the 27th of November.

A new handbook gives members of parliaments arguments and advice to work towards abolition in their countries and to support their colleagues abroad.

The Iraqi institutions established after the US-led invasion and the fall of Saddam Hussein have reinstated the death penalty and extended its scope since 2004. In this op-ed article, Iraqi Coalition Against the Death Penalty president Nassr Abood calls for alternative sentences and for a strong stance from the international community.

Kigali hosted the Inter-African conference against the death penalty on 13 and 14 October.

At the invitation of its American members, the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty is holding its 15th general meeting at The Catholic University of America in Washington D.C., USA on 22-24 June 2017.

Conferences, round tables, talks, tours, meetings with politicians, debates, press conferences, sit-ins, cultural evenings, marches and speeches are among the many events that will take place in Africa for this 9th World Day Against the Death Penalty.

On 22 February 2016, the representatives of more than twenty countries gathered in Rome for the 9th International Congress of the Ministers of Justice « A World without the death penalty », organized by the Community of Sant’Egidio and hosted by the Italian Chamber of Deputies. Burundi, Cambodia, Central African Republic, Congo, El Salvador, Guinea Conakry, Cȏte d’Ivoire, Mali, Mongolia, Rwanda, Somalia, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Timor-Leste, Togo, Uganda, Viet Nam, Zimbabwe are the countries who joined Italy in the last edition of this annual conference.

The latest vote at the UN General Assembly shows wider support than ever for a resolution on a moratorium on the use of the death penalty.

Rwanda and Burundi are apparently close to abolishing the death penalty; in the Democratic Republic of Congo, all references to capital punishment have been removed from the text of the constitution. The death penalty is on borrowed time in these countries scarred by conflicts. For the first time, the region’s abolitionists met in Paris and called for the creation of a regional coalition.

After weeks of debates, Tunisia has adopted a new Constitution. As expected by local abolitionists, the National Constituent Assembly (NCA) passed a text allowing capital punishment on 26 January 2014.

Even though Taiwanese general mindset appears to be quite in favor of death penalty, Taiwanese civil society expects some changes to happen in the application of death penalty under the presidency of Tsai Ing-wen. In his article “Taiwan: Can Tsai Ing-Wen Change the Politics of Death?”, Michael Caster – graduate student at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, as well as human rights advocate and civil society consultant based in East Asia – quotes Executive Director of the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty, Lin Hsin-yi, on that controversial matter.

Wherever the Action by Christians for the Abolition of Torture (ACAT) is present, the struggle against the death penalty is an important element within their commitment to respect for human dignity.

In 2007 abolitionists celebrated when the High Court of Malawi abolished the mandatory death penalty. In what become known as the Kafanteyeni ruling the mandatory death penalty was deemed by the bench as unconstitutional as it amounts to an arbitrary deprivation of life, denies an accused the right to a fair trial and the right to be free from inhuman and degrading treatment.

Gathered in Rabat on World Day Against the Death Penalty, Moroccan and international politicians, religious leaders and campaigners held advanced discussions on this subject. The country has not carried out a single execution in the last fifteen years.

On 19 and 20 September, World Coalition member organisation Penal Reform International (PRI) is bringing 120 people from retentionist countries to London to discuss global trends towards abolition of the death penalty.

Several World Coalition members carried out intense advocacy activities during and after the March session of the Human Rights Council to prepare for the coming UPR session, during which Liberia, Malawi and the USA will be examined.

Two more federal executions were carried out at the end of August in the United States of America. The abolitionist movement in the United States denounces human rights violations, challenges the cost of the death penalty in this time of crisis and even opposes its disrespect for tribal sovereignity.

The World Coalition Against the Death Penalty recruits a logistics and partnership manager for a full time permanent position starting as soon as possible.

Iran has taken a dreadful step in the wrong direction in the summer of 2007, through a combination of an increase in executions and the repression of activists opposed to the death penalty.

The Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) is the only universal international treaty that prohibits executions and provides essential mechanisms to entrench the abolition of the death penalty in the world. As of the 15th January 2017, 84 States out of the 169 State parties to the ICCPR […]

France, Peru, Togo, India… Abolitionist activists sounded a rallying call for the 5th World Day Against the Death Penalty across numerous countries via a variety of initiatives.

Lawmakers in the US State of Connecticut have abolished capital punishment and the State’s governor has said that he would sign the bill into law. Elizabeth Zitrin of the US NGO Death Penalty Focus chairs the World Coalition’s working group on the United States. She writes on the significance of this news for the wider abolitionist movement.

A wide variety of abolitionist actors gathered in Geneva between February 24-26 for the 4th World Congress Against the Death Penalty. After three days of working sessions, the participants called on abolitionist states and internatinonal institutions to support their efforts.

The Parliament of Suriname (photo) has abolished the death penalty in law, setting an example for the Greater Caribbean – a major front line in the global fight against capital punishment. World Coalition member organisation Parliamentarians for Global Action provided crucial support for abolition in Suriname.

Newly elected Governor Tom Wolf placed a moratorium on executions in Pennsylvania on 13 February until concerns about the fairness of the state’s death penalty system are addressed.

The Transitional Justice Working Group (TJWG) released a report in June 2019 entitled “Mapping the Fate of the Dead (Killings and Burials in North Korea)”.

The winds of change have brought fresh air to the abolitionist cause in countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa, with new faces in power reigniting a stalled debate.

The Executive Committee of the Greater Caribbean for Life (GCL) network, constituted in October 2013, met in San Juan, Puerto Rico on January 11 and 12 to devise strategies to combat the death penalty in the region.

Mass executions in Iraq since 2017 seem to hide behind the scourge of terrorism, the major argument given by the current government. Will May 2018 elections defeat this government policy and the misuse of the country’s anti-terrorism law to sentence to death?

The President of the Central African Republic promulgated the law abolishing the death penalty on June 27 2022, one month after the National Assembly passed the law. CAR is now the 24th abolitionist state in Africa and the 111th in the world.

On Tuesday, April 18th 2017, Together Against the Death Penalty (ECPM) held an award ceremony at the City Hall of Paris for their “Educational Project on Human Rights and the Abolition of the Death Penalty”.

The role of lawyers in the fight against the death penalty has been discussed from different angles throughout the 5th World Congress, but the testimony of Chinese lawyers caught most people’s attention.

Abolitionists in the Arab World have been generating increased mobilisation and improved co-ordination, with the assistance of Penal Reform International, a member of the World Coalition.

The United Nations, the European Union and the international community must put the situation of the death penalty at the top of the agenda in their dialogue with Iran.

Hands Off Cain organised a conference on the abolition and moratorium of the death penalty in West Africa on January 13 and 14, in partnership with the government of Sierra Leone and with support from the World Coalition, the European Union and FIACAT.

On 21 January, India’s Supreme Court formally banned the execution of mentally ill prisoners and in doing so highlighted why this year’s World Day against the Death Penalty, which is dedicated to issues of mental health, is so important.

In its 2019 annual report, the Organization Against Torture in Tunisia (Organisation contre la torture en Tunisie, OCTT) denounced the death penalty and identified it as the most cruel form of torture.

The Death Penalty Information Center’s 2023 report highlights a rising trend towards abolition in the US, evidenced by a decrease in states conducting executions and heightened backing for individuals asserting innocence. In 2023, the United States witnessed 24 executions, 21 death sentences, and three exonerations, reflecting this evolving trend. 

The Japanese government continues to execute prisoners with psychiatric illnesses and the conditions on death row provoke mental disorders among inmates, according to a new Amnesty International report.

On 16 May, Amnesty International published their annual report on the global use of the death penalty, which shows the overall number and trends in sentencing and executions in 2022.

Together against the death penalty, the Mauritanian Association for Human Rights, The Advocates for Human Rights and the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty welcome the adoption of the report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review of Mauritania by the Human Rights Council.

A hard-line group of Asian countries are defying the global trend against the death penalty and putting to death thousands of people after unfair trials every year, the Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network (ADPAN) said today in a new report.

The World Coalition Against the Death Penalty warmly congratulates the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on the adoption of Resolution A/RES/75/183 for a moratorium on the use of the death penalty, which was adopted by a great majority of 123 UN Member States on 16 December 2020.

Human rights organisations and governments worldwide have slammed the Iranian authorities for the illegal execution of Delara Darabi, a young woman convicted of a murder committed when she was 17.

A bill to repeal the death penalty in the US state of New Hampshire was blocked in the Senate on 22 April with votes for and against the bill deadlocked at 12-12. Despite the disappointment, Renny Cushing, Executive Director of World Coalition member organisation Murder Victims’ Families for Human Rights, sees some positives.

During the past year, the 28 member associations in the FIACAT network have given their abolitionist activities a boost. The issue of the death penalty is at the heart of their mission.

A debate led by members of the World Coalition in the Democratic Republic of Congo discussed international law, local sensitivities and abolition.

Citizens of the largest US state have voted against an initiative to replace the death penalty with life sentences, but the results show abolitionist views have gained significant ground through the referendum campaign.

A delegation of the International Commission against the Death Penalty met US Governors and Attorney Generals to discuss the situation of the death penalty in their respective states and issues related to possible steps towards ending the practice of capital punishment in the United States.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has published a new report and called for abolition of the death penalty.

NGOs and international organisations opposing the death penalty in Arab countries have met in Egypt for the second time. The World Coalition presented them with a new version of its study on abolition in the region.

The World Coalition Against the Death Penalty has obtained financial support from the European Commission for its 2007 campaign, an indication of its growing recognition and legitimacy.

The West African nation outlawed the death penalty in February 2010 and then kept the secret for over a year.

The increased number of prisoners executed for offences committed before they turned 18 is in clear violation of Iran’s international commitments, the World Coalition says in the statement below.

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have long been at the forefront of the movement for human dignity, as the main, highly-specialized – and sometimes isolated– champions for social justice. However, a new generation of advocates from the private sector, whose primary center of interest or area of expertise seems disconnected from international human rights standards, has been […]

The ECOWAS Court has upheld the rights of death row detainees following litigation by World Coalition member organisation ASF France and Nigerian human rights defedenders.

The Death Penalty Information Center’s 2018 End-of-Year report confirms decline despite strong lasting inequalities.

World Coalition member organization FIACAT has taken part in a follow up mission to the Ivory Coast after the African human rights body issued the country with recommendations including ratifying the treaty that copperfastens abolition.

World Coalition member Reprieve and the Mexican government share their experience of helping those facing a capital case overseas.

The World Coalition Against the Death Penalty strongly condemn the resumption of public executions in Iran and the surge in the executions in 2022, which goes against the international trends towards abolition of the death penalty.

On the occasion of the screening of the movie Lindy Lou Juror number 2 on Monday 25 June 2018, abolitionist associations such as Amnesty International, ACAT France, Together Against The Death Penalty French Collectif Free Mumia! and the World Coalition against the Death Penalty met at the Centre Wallonie Bruxelles in Paris.

The Puerto Rican Coalition Against the Death Penalty and the Puerto Rican secretary of justice are joining forces to resist death sentences imposed by US federal courts.

Fifteen capital defense lawyers from eight African countries arrived at Cornell Law School on June 12 to begin eight days of training on how best to represent death penalty clients in the first session of the Makwanyane Institute.

On 10 January 2017, São Tomé and Príncipe ratified the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty and became its 84th State party.

A report on the death penalty by the UN mission to Iraq has unearthed startling new information about the use of capital punishment in the country. The study was released on the heels of the UN’s human rights review of Iraq, where the death penalty emerged as a primary concern.

Hundreds of activists descended on Sacramento for a public review of the state’s lethal injection protocol, arguing that «the death penalty is killing California’s budget».