Below you’ll find breaking news as well as reports, updates on our campaigns, and victories.
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Update
TJ Riggs: “It’s difficult to watch Alabama continue to kill people and to do it so mercilessly and so often”
TJ Riggs is Amnesty International’s Death Penalty Abolition Coordinator for Alabama. He talks about fighting on behalf of those on death row.
May 31, 2024
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Press Release
Global: Executions Soar to Highest Number in Almost a DecadeÂ
A total of 1,153 executions took place in 2023, which does not include the thousands believed to have been carried out in China, marking an increase of more than 30% from 2022.
May 28, 2024
![01/27/2024 Washington DC, United States. Iranian members of the diaspora and activists gather at the Lincoln Memorial in the National Mall, Washington D.C., during the 'United Against Executions in Iran' protest on January 27, 2024. They condemn the increase in death sentences by the rulers of the Islamic Republic of Iran. According to Human Rights Activists in Iran (HRANA), a non-political and non-governmental organization dedicated to defending human rights, at least 746 people were executed in Iran in 2023. (Photo by Ali Khaligh / Middle East Images / Middle East Images via AFP) (Photo by ALI KHALIGH/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)](/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/299950_Stop-Executions-in-Iran-scaled.jpg)
Report
Amnesty International Global Report: Death Sentences and Executions 2023
Amnesty International's report covers the judicial use of the death penalty from January to December 2023.
May 28, 2024
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Press Release
Amnesty International Delivers Thousands of Petitions to Alabama Governor, Asking Her to Grant Clemency to Rocky Myers and Commute His Death Sentence
The death penalty is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. With a swipe of her pen, Governor Ivey could end the injustice that has tarnished Rocky Myers’ case for three decades.
March 21, 2024
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Press Release
Amnesty International USA Condemns Alabama’s Execution of Kenneth Smith, Calls for Moratorium on Use of the Death Penalty as First Critical Step
The death penalty is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment and accounts of Kenneth Smith’s last moments simply show that there is no humane way to take someone’s life.
January 26, 2024
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Press Release
Amnesty International USA: Cruel Planned Execution of Kenneth Smith by State of Alabama Must Be StoppedÂ
Amnesty International USA urges Alabama Governor Kay Ivey to use her clemency power to stop the execution of Kenneth Smith before it’s too late.Â
January 23, 2024
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Update
Two Steps Forward, Two Steps Back – Updates on the Death Penalty in 2023
On 16 May, Amnesty International released its annual Death Sentences and Executions report which documents the global developments on the use of the death penalty in 2022. As the restrictions put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic began to wane in 2022, Amnesty International documented a spike in known executions around the world, with sharp increases in Iran and Saudi Arabia. The USA was no exception to this spike, seeing its execution numbers increase by 64% despite remaining at historically low levels. US exceptionalism on the death penalty was also perpetuated as the country was the lone executing country in…
August 4, 2023
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Press Release
DEATH PENALTY 2022: Recorded Executions Skyrocket to Highest Figure in Five Years
Recorded executions in 2022 reached the highest figure in five years, as the Middle East and North Africa’s most notorious executioners carried out killing sprees, Amnesty International said today as it released its annual review of the death penalty.
May 16, 2023
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Press Release
Sri Lanka: Biden Must Respond to Dangerous Anti-Terrorism Act
“The draft Anti-Terrorism Act categorically fails on every human rights benchmark. If the Biden administration values the rights of the Sri Lankan people, they need to send a clear message to President Ranil Wickremesinghe that this law must be overhauled entirely or scrapped altogether.”
April 14, 2023
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Press Release
Depths of Degradation, Heights of Hypocrisy: USA’s First Execution of 2023
Paul O’Brien, Amnesty International USA A macabre ritual, incompatible with human dignity but enacted over one and a half thousand times in the USA in the past four and a half decades, is set to continue into 2023. On 3 January, the State of Missouri carried out the USA’s first execution of the year, and the 1,559th since the US Supreme Court upheld new capital statutes in 1976. Almost 90% of these executions have been conducted since June 1992 when the USA ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), article 6 of which protects the right to…
January 4, 2023
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Press Release
First Executions in Myanmar in Decades Mark Atrocious Escalation in State Repression Â
Responding to reports that Myanmar’s military authorities have carried out executions for the first time since the late 1980s, Amnesty International’s Regional Director Erwin van der Borght said: 
July 25, 2022
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Report
Biden Must Take Action on Promise to End Federal Death Penalty
Ahead of the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Furman v. Georgia ruling, which temporarily outlawed executions in the USA, Amnesty International reminds President Biden and the federal authorities of the urgent need to meet his promise to work for permanent eradication of the death penalty. Justin Mazzola, Deputy Director, Research, at Amnesty International USA, said:
June 27, 2022