Summary / Key Findings / Recommendations

The report updates previous reports on the question of the death penalty. In the report, the Secretary-General confirms the trend towards the universal abolition of the death penalty and highlights initiatives limiting its use and implementing the safeguards guaranteeing protection of the rights of those facing the death penalty. A minority of States continued to use the death penalty, in contravention of their international human rights law obligations. The report also includes information on the human rights of children of parents sentenced to the death penalty or executed.

Methodology

The report covers the period July 2018–May 2020. It is based largely on a call for inputs circulated to States, national human rights institutions, United Nations entities, international and regional intergovernmental bodies and non-governmental organizations.

Background

In its decision 18/117 adopted on 28 September 2011, the Human Rights Council requested “the Secretary-General to continue to submit to the Human Rights Council, in consultation with Governments, specialized agencies and intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, a yearly supplement to his quinquennial report on capital punishment and the implementation of the safeguards guaranteeing protection of the rights of those facing the death penalty, paying special attention to the imposition of the death penalty on persons younger than 18 years of age at the time of the offence, on pregnant women and on persons with mental or intellectual disabilities.” Furthermore, in its resolution 22/11, adopted on 21 March 2013, the Human Rights Council decided that “the yearly supplement to the quinquennial report of the Secretary-General on the question of the death penalty will continue to inform” on the matter of “the human rights of children of parents sentenced to the death penalty or executed”.