Pakistan ends capital punishment for drug trafficking convicts
KARACHI, Pakistan (AA) – Pakistan’s parliament on Tuesday approved new anti-narcotics legislation, removing capital punishment for drug trafficking convicts.
The maximum punishment for a convict of a drug-related crime will be life imprisonment, whereas the minimum will be a six-month jail term.
“Anti-narcotics bill passed, removing capital punishment,” Commerce Minister Syed Naveed Qamar tweeted.
The legislation “Control of Narcotics Substances Act, 2023” was passed during a joint session of the lower house – the National Assembly – and the upper house – the Senate – in the capital Islamabad, and will come into force at once.
Pakistan imposed a ban on capital punishment in 2008 in exchange for trade incentives from the EU.
However, it lifted the six-year ban on capital punishment after a gun-and-bomb attack on an army school in northwestern Peshawar city in December 2014.
Since then, some 518 convicts have been executed.
Currently, there are more than 4,000 death-row convicts across Pakistan.
In February 2021, Pakistan’s Supreme Court, in a landmark judgment, ruled that prisoners with serious mental health problems cannot be executed for their crimes.
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