A report by Amnesty International (AI), titled Death Sentences and Executions in 2024, covers the judicial use of the death penalty for the period January to December 2024.
AI’s monitoring shows an increase by 32% in recorded executions compared to 2023. This reportedly does not include the thousands of people believed to have been executed in China, as well as in North Korea and Viet Nam, also believed to have resorted to executions extensively. For the second consecutive year, executing countries reached the lowest number on record.
The number of executions recorded worldwide jumped to over 1,500 in 2024, says AI — the most since 2015. And with some countries refusing to report numbers, thousands more are suspected.
Iran, Saudi Arabia and Iraq accounted for 90% of the recorded cases and were responsible for the steep spike. Iran topped the list. It reportedly put at least 972 people to death, up from 853 the year before.
In Saudi Arabia, figures doubled to at least 345 — the most ever recorded for the country by the human rights watchdog AI.
In Iraq, the death penalty was reportedly implemented 63 times, almost a quadrupling of numbers in comparison to 2023.
AI, however, named China as the “world's lead executioner” in its annual report, saying that the information available indicated that thousands had been executed there. The country refuses to disclose data. The NGO also suspects North Korea and Vietnam of extensively resorting to the death penalty.
According to AI, more than 40% of executions in 2024 were drug-related. The report notes that carrying out the death penalty for drugs crimes is also widely prevalent in Singapore and China.
The report says the United States remains the outlier in Western democracies in its use of the death penalty. While there was only a slight rise in figures overall in the US in 2024 from 24 to 25 executions, there were concerning trends, according to AI.
In Alabama, the number of executions reportedly doubled and included the use of nitrogen gas. UN monitors have said death by suffocation with nitrogen hypoxia could amount to torture.
Despite the alarming spike in executions in 2024, AI said only 15 countries were known to have carried out the death penalty — the second consecutive year that the figure has been that low.
A total of 145 countries have now abolished the death penalty in law or practice. And for the first time, two-thirds of the UN General Assembly voted in favor of a moratorium on the use of the death penalty.
