Zimbabwe abolishes death penalty almost 20 years after its last hanging

Zimbabwe has abolished the death penalty, a widely expected move in a country that last carried out the punishment nearly two decades ago.

President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who once faced the death penalty himself in the 1960s during the war of independence, approved the law this week after a bill passed through Parliament.

Zimbabwe has about 60 prisoners on death row, and the new law spares them.

The country last executed someone in 2005, partly because at one point no one was willing to take up the job of state executioner.

Amnesty International on Tuesday described the law as "a beacon of hope for the abolitionist movement in the region."

Other African countries such as Kenya, Liberia and Ghana have recently taken "positive steps" towards abolishing the death penalty but are yet to put it into law, according to the human rights group, which campaigns against the death penalty.

Mnangagwa, Zimbabwe's leader since 2017, has publicly spoken of his opposition to capital punishment. He has cited his experience of being sentenced to death - later changed to 10 years in prison - for blowing up a train during the war of independence from white minority rule.

He also has used presidential amnesties to commute death sentences to life in prison.

According to Amnesty International, about three-quarters of countries in the world use capital punishment. It says 24 African countries have fully abolished the death penalty, among 113 countries globally.

Amnesty International said it recorded 1,153 known executions globally in 2023, up from 883 the previous year, although countries that carried out executions declined from 20 to 16. Due to a veil of secrecy, the figures do not include those in North Korea, Vietnam and China, which the rights group has described as the "world's lead executioner."

Iran and Saudi Arabia accounted for almost 90% of all executions recorded by Amnesty in 2023, followed by Somalia and the US.