Burkina Faso parliament unanimously votes to reinstate the death penalty

Burkina Faso’s parliament unanimously voted to reinstate the death penalty, a decision announced Tuesday by the Justice Ministry. The new penal code makes capital punishment applicable to crimes including terrorism, espionage, treason, parricide, and importing expired or prohibited products that cause death. The death penalty was abolished in 2018, and the last recorded execution was in 1988, according to Amnesty International, which had urged the country not to restore it. The country has been ruled by a military junta since the 2022 coup and has faced deadly jihadist violence for more than a decade.