Death Sentence
An estimated 682 people in 21 countries were executed in 2012, according to Amnesty International's latest Death Sentences and Executions report. That figure excludes China, which, the NGO noted, "accounts for more executions than the rest of the world combined," but on which there is little hard data. Of this official figure, just three countries were responsible for three-quarters of the deaths: Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. While many serious crimes merited the ultimate punishment, many states deployed the death penalty at political opponents and for crimes such as apostasy and sorcery. However, the global trend line is toward the abolition of the death penalty as punishment for even the most serious of crimes, according to Amnesty. As UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon stated last year, "the balance has shifted between a substantial majority of states that maintained the death penalty to these states becoming a minority." These abolitionist states, Ban noted, "represent different legal systems, traditions, cultures and religious backgrounds." These are the states that executed the most people in 2012. (AP Photo)
