Death sentence
Death sentence, death penalty or capital punishment. These are all the name for a person being killed by the government as a punishment for doing something against the law. Crimes that are punishable by death are known as capital crimes or capital offences, for exampel murder, treason, espionage, war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.
Execution of criminals has been used by pretty much all contries some time in the history. Back in the days the executions themselves often involved torture with cruel methods and there used to be a big crowd watching.
The majority of the contrys today do not have death sentence. The contries that still have it is USA, China, India, Japan and some contries in the middle east.
Amnesty International writes that the death penalty breaches human rights, in particular the right to life and the right to live free from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Both rights are protected under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the UN in 1948. According to Amnesty International, the death penalty is a symptom of a culture of violence, not a solution to it.