ODIHR Director Link welcomes Nebraska legislature vote abolishing capital punishment
WARSAW, 28 May 2015 – Michael Georg Link, Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) today commended the legislature of Nebraska for voting to abolish the death penalty in that U.S. state.
“The legislature’s vote to abolish capital punishment is a welcome one,” Link said. “It is my hope that those states that continue to carry out executions will give serious consideration to following Nebraska’s example in abolishing this practice.”
The 30-19 vote in the legislature overrode a veto of the bill by the state’s governor, Pete Ricketts, when it first reached his desk on Wednesday.
While there is no OSCE commitment on the abolishment of the death penalty, OSCE participating States, including the United States, have committed themselves to keep the question of abolishment under consideration.
Further, the 2013 Istanbul Final Declaration by the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly called on all states to adopt a moratorium on all executions, with the ultimate goal of abolishing the death penalty completely.
ODIHR publishes an annual background paper providing information on the status of the death penalty across the OSCE’s 57 participating States. The 2014 edition of the Background Paper, released last September, stated that 51 of these countries have abolished capital punishment outright, while another four maintain the penalty in law, but have moratoriums on carrying out executions. Belarus and the United States continue to maintain the death penalty in practice.