Italian group says executions on the rise in Iraq, China still world’s top executioner

Italian group says executions on the rise in Iraq

ROME — Iraq is now among the world’s top executioners for the first time since the 2003 fall of Saddam Hussein, an Italian anti-death penalty group said Saturday, reporting that the number of the country’s executions rose dramatically last year.

China and Iran are still the world’s top two executioners, according to the report released by Hands Off Cain and covering 2009 and the first six months of this year. The group said its estimates were based on reports by media and other rights groups, as the exact number in China and other states is kept secret.

China alone accounted for some 5,000 executions, representing 90 percent of the 5,679 capital punishments worldwide.

The Chinese figure is virtually unchanged from the previous report, though the number of executions worldwide dropped by about 50 percent.

Iran carried out 402 executions, its highest figure in a decade.

The report said Iraq put at least 77 people to death, compared with fewer than 35 in each of the two previous years.

The United States carried out 52 executions in 2009, compared with 37 the year before, the report said. But it noted that for some months between late 2007 and 2008 executions in Texas and other states had been put on hold pending a Supreme Court decision on whether the standard lethal injection procedure complied with the constitution.

The report also said 106 death sentences were handed down in the United States last year, the lowest number since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment in 1976.