Overview
OSCE participating States have made a number of commitments regarding the
death penalty, although there are no specific OSCE commitments requiring the
abolition of this type of sanction. In the Vienna Document,1 participating States
agreed that the death penalty could be imposed only for the most serious crimes and
only in line with international commitments. Moreover, states agreed to consider the
potential abolition of the death penalty, to exchange information toward that end,
and to make information on the use of the death penalty available to the public.2 In
the light of these commitments and its mandate, the OSCE Office for Democratic
Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) monitors the trends and developments
among OSCE participating States and their application of the death penalty. The
findings are presented each year in ODIHR’s publication, Background Paper on
the Status of the Death Penalty in the OSCE Area. The background paper is based
on the information provided by participating States in the form of responses to
ODIHR questionnaires; the information from their responses is supplemented with
information from international and non-governmental organizations and media
reports.
This year ODIHR prepared three different questionnaires – for retentionist, de facto
abolitionist and abolitionist participating States, respectively. The first questionnaire
seeks to gather information on the relevant legal framework, the statistics on death
sentences and executions, and the safeguards in those participating States that
still impose the death penalty. De-facto abolitionist states were asked to provide
information on developments regarding the moratoriums in place, ratification of
different international instruments dealing with abolition of the death penalty,
means of co-operation with local and/or international organizations in relation
to the death penalty, statistics on nationals facing the death penalty abroad and
safeguards for children of parents who are on death row. The third questionnaire,
for abolitionist participating States, focused on activities that those states took part
1 Concluding Document of the Vienna Meeting (Third Follow-up Meeting to the Helsinki Conference, 15 January
1989, Vienna), paragraph 24, <http://www.osce.org/mc/16262>.
2 Document of the Copenhagen Meeting of the Conference on the Human Dimension of the OSCE, 29 June 1990,
Copenhagen, paragraph,17.7 and 17.8, <http://www.osce.org/odihr/elections/14304>.
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