IACHR
Press Release
The IACHR Stresses Its Call for the Abolition of the Death Penalty in the Americas On the World Day Against the Death Penalty
October 9, 2020
IACHR Press Office
[email protected]
Washington, D.C. - On the World Day Against the Death Penalty, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) stresses its call for Member States of the Organization of American States (OAS) to abolish the death penalty or, failing that, to impose a moratorium on executions, as a step towards their gradual abolition. The IACHR further urges the States that have not done so to ratify the Protocol to the American Convention on Human Rights to Abolish the Death Penalty.
The Inter-American Human Rights System has played a crucial role to establish international standards concerning the death penalty. The Commission was the first international human rights organization to examine and assess the consequences of the compulsory application of this form of punishment on the enjoyment of human rights. The Commission concluded that the death penalty is incompatible with the rights to life, humane treatment, and due process. For decades, the Inter-American Commission has identified the death penalty as a crucial challenge for human rights. While most Member States of the OAS have abolished the death penalty, a significant minority still hold on to this form of punishment.
The IACHR further stresses that regional instruments for the protection of human rights do not ban the death penalty per se, but impose specific restrictions and prohibitions concerning its application. The American Convention on Human Rights includes dispositions to restrict the application of the death penalty, with the aim of reducing it until it is finally abolished. There is a global trend in the direction of abolishing the death penalty that is evident in recent developments at the level of the United Nations, regional systems for the protection of human rights, and international criminal law.
The American Convention reduces the scope for application of the death penalty to only the most serious crimes, and it establishes that it should not be extended to crimes to which it does not currently apply and that it should not be reestablished in States that have already abolished. According to the Commission, this is evidence of the Convention’s clear goal of protecting the right to life. Moving toward the abolition of the death penalty therefore needs to be a common goal across the Americas.
In this context, the IACHR stresses the recommendation held in its report The Death Penalty in the Inter-American Human Rights System: From Restrictions to Abolition, aimed at ending this form of punishment. The Commission also urges the States that have not done so to ratify the Protocol to the American Convention on Human Rights to Abolish the Death Penalty.
A principal, autonomous body of the Organization of American States (OAS), the IACHR derives its mandate from the OAS Charter and the American Convention on Human Rights. The Inter-American Commission has a mandate to promote respect for and to defend human rights in the region and acts as a consultative body to the OAS in this area. The Commission is composed of seven independent members who are elected in an individual capacity by the OAS General Assembly and who do not represent their countries of origin or residence.
No. 248/20