FIACAT Oral Statement cosponsored by Advocates for Human Rights, Avocats sans Frontières (ASF), Together Against the Death penalty (ECPM) and Parliamentarians for Global Actions.
General debate under item 3
51st session of the Human Rights Council
20 Septembrer 2022
Thank you Mr. President,
FIACAT and several organisations member of the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty welcome the Secretary-General's report on the question of the death penalty. They would like to highlight two opportunities to continue the abolitionist trend on the African continent.
As Ghana prepares for its 4th Universal Periodic Review, a private member's bill to abolish the death penalty is to be considered by Parliament.
In Liberia, the bill presented by the executive to abolish the death penalty would finally bring the State in line with its commitments as a State Party to the Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR.
Our organisations, therefore, encourage these two states to expedite these initiatives toward abolition.
Our organisations also appreciate that the link between the death penalty and torture, the theme of this 2022 World Day against the Death Penalty, is addressed in the report. We remain convinced that the death penalty and torture are intrinsically linked. The evolution of practices and international opinion highlights the difficulty, if not the impossibility, of imposing the death penalty while guaranteeing respect for the absolute prohibition of torture throughout the whole process.
Thus, our organisations believe that, from sentencing to execution, the death penalty inevitably causes physical harm and psychological suffering that amounts to torture or ill-treatment and calls on all States to abolish it definitively.
Thank you for your attention.
 HRC 51 - FIACAT Statement - GD under item 3.pdf |