Rabat - Director General of Amnesty International Morocco, Mohamed Sektaoui, on Wednesday called on the Moroccan government to adopt the United Nations moratorium on the death penalty and the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty.
Mr. Sektaoui, who was presenting the 2015 world report of Amnesty International on the death penalty during a meeting with the press, also called for the implementation of the recommendations of the Equity and Reconciliation Commission to abolish the death penalty and "all signs related to the death penalty in the penal code".
With nine death sentences in 2015 and a de facto moratorium, Morocco holds a good position among MENA countries, where 831 death sentences were recorded in 17 countries and 1,196 executed judgments in 8 countries, he pointed out.
The use of capital punishment increased significantly in 2015 in the MENA region, Sektaoui said, adding that the total number of known executions increased by 26 pc compared to 2014, while the death sentences posted a 6pc increase.
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