CALLING capital punishment “an abhorrent practice” that “serves no deterrent value and cannot be reconciled with the right to life,” a group of United Nations human rights experts on Thursday urged U.S. President Joe Biden to do everything he can to end executions at both the federal and state level.
“We call on President Biden to urgently grant clemency to the 48 individuals currently on death row for federal crimes.”
The experts—who include Nils Melzer, the special rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment—took exception with U.S. officials’ claims “that capital punishment can be implemented in a ‘humane’ fashion.”
“Executions have repeatedly resulted in degrading spectacles,” they said. “The death penalty is an inherently flawed form of punishment which disproportionately impacts African Americans and people living in poverty.”
The U.N. officials noted the case of Lisa Montgomery—a mentally ill victim of a lifetime of extreme physical
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