Lebanon has become the first country in the Middle East to abolish the death penalty.
On Tuesday, a majority of the 128-member parliament voted in favour of scrapping capital punishment. Death sentences will be replaced with life imprisonment with aggravated hard labour.
Lebanon has observed an unofficial moratorium on executions since January 2004, but its courts have continued to issue dozens of death sentences.
At the end of 2025, 85 people were facing death sentences, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Justice’s Directorate of Prisons.
Which countries still have the death penalty?
According to the latest Amnesty International report on death sentences and executions, as of December, close to three-quarters of the world’s countries had abolished the death penalty in law or practice, meaning they have not carried out executions for the past 10 years.
Some countries have abolished the death penalty for “ordinary crimes” only, which refers to exceptional crimes such as those committed under military law or those committed in exceptional circumstances
Overall, this includes:
- Abolition for all crimes: 113 countries
- Abolition for ordinary crimes only: nine countries
- Abolition in practice: 23 countries
- Retention: 54 countries
The map below highlights where each country stands on capital punishment:
Which countries have the death penalty in 2026?
Which countries have the death penalty in 2026?
Three-quarters of the world has now abolished the death penalty in law or in practice according to Amnesty International.
STATUS
Retentionist (has the death penalty in practice)
Abolitionist in practice (not executed anyone over the past 10 years)
Abolitionist for ordinary crimes only (crimes not committed during times of war)
Abolitionist for all crimes
Use the arrow keys ↑ ↓ ← → to navigate through the map regions.
Hover over each country for more information
Map:AJLabsSource: Amnesty International, Al Jazeera | August 25, 2026
Death penalty status (2026)
Death penalty status (2026)
Abolitionist for all crimes
113
Abolitionist for ordinary crimes only (crimes not committed during times of war)
9
Abolitionist in practice (not executed anyone over the past 10 years)
23
Retentionist (has the death penalty in practice)
54
Chart:AJLabsSource: Amnesty International, | August 25, 2026
Amnesty International’s monitoring of worldwide use of the death penalty recorded 2,707 executions in 2025, up 78 percent from 1,518 in 2024. Amnesty attributed that spike primarily to executions in Iran, which more than doubled from 972 in 2024 to at least 2,159 in 2025.
Amnesty’s figures exclude what it says are thousands of executions that have been carried out in China. Executions were carried out in 17 countries, consistent with the historical lows seen since 2018.
