Most Executions Since 1989

    In 2015, at least 1634 people were executed all around the world as a result of their sentence to death according to Amnesty International (AI). This number is highest since 1989 (year-on-year rise was +573 executions compared to 2014, it is 54%) and the truth is that the reality is even worse as the numbers from China are not public. In China, number of executions is a matter of state secret. It is widely believed that thousands of people were executed in China, which makes the most populated country in the world to be leader of the chart also in this controversial field.

     Except China, most executions were realized in Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United States. Countries like China, Iran or Saudi Arabia are using death penalty to punish crimes like drug dealing, corruption or even adultery and blasphemy. However, this type of criminal behaviour is not meeting law standards of the most serious crimes which are punishable by death according to international law. 

Countries with the most executions realized in 2015
Country	Number of executions in 2015
China	N/A
Iran	977
Pakistan	326
Saudi Arabia	158
United States	28
Source: Amnesty International

     In Iran and Pakistan, people younger than 18 years of age can be executed as well. In 2015, at least four kids (completely proper word in this case) were killed in Iran, five in Pakistan.

     On the other hand, four countries (Madagascar, Fiji, Kongo and Surinam) abolished the death penalty and Mongolia decided to do so in 2016. Therefore, for the first time in history, the majority of world´s countries (102) do not have a death penalty in its law system.

     It can be said that those countries which are using the death penalty extensively are closed and politically isolated with authoritative regimes. It can be applied to China, Iran, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. These four countries are responsible for significantly more than 90% (because of lack of Chinese data, this number is only a rough estimation) of world´s executions. Than there is a large gap between Saudi Arabia on fourth place and the United States on fifth place.