ARTICLE TEXT

The numbers describe a country in two minds. According to Amnesty International, courts in Bangladesh imposed at least 185 death sentences in 2025 and at least 165 in 2024, yet carried out no executions in either year, the first such gap since 2018. More than two thousand prisoners are under sentence of death. In December 2024, Bangladesh abstained on the UN General Assembly’s resolution calling for a moratorium on executions, having voted against every previous version. The Law Adviser told the UN human rights chief that abolition was not feasible in the current context. The question is nonetheless being asked. Here are the arguments.

The Case for Retention

Supporters of the death penalty in Bangladesh make four main arguments. The first is justice. For the gravest crimes, the murder of a child, mass killing, the rape and murder of a woman, they argue that no lesser punishment matches the wrong. The public expects it, and a legal system that ignores that expectation loses legitimacy.

The second is deterrence. Retentionists argue that in a society where the certainty of punishment is low, the severity of the ultimate penalty matters, and that abolition would signal weakness to organised crime and to those who traffic in drugs and people.

The third is history. The death penalty has been part of the law of this territory since the Penal Code of 1860. It was used against the war criminals of 1971 and the killers of Bangabandhu. Many Bangladeshis see it as inseparable from accountability for the country’s foundational crimes.

The fourth is democratic. Thirty-three offences carry the death penalty because elected Parliaments put it there. If public opinion changes, Parliament can change the law. Until then, the courts should apply it.

The Case for Abolition

Abolitionists answer each point. On justice, they argue that the penalty is applied not to the worst offenders but to the poorest and least well represented. Trials in Bangladesh depend heavily on confessions and police investigation, and the guidelines in BLAST v Bangladesh exist precisely because those investigations cannot always be trusted. An irreversible penalty in a system with an admitted risk of error is, they say, indefensible.

On deterrence, they point to the evidence. Decades of research in the United States and elsewhere have found no reliable deterrent effect from executions beyond that of long imprisonment. What deters is the likelihood of being caught, and Bangladesh’s conviction rates in serious crime remain low. The recent explosion in death sentences has not been matched by any fall in the offences that attract them.

On history, abolitionists note that the same Penal Code was written by colonial administrators who also gave us section 54 and the law of sedition. The fact that a punishment is old does not make it right. And they observe that the 1971 trials could have imposed life imprisonment without loss of accountability.

On democracy, they argue that the trend is already clear. The courts struck down the mandatory death penalty in the Shukur Ali case in 2015 and, in May 2024, held that solitary confinement of condemned prisoners before their appeals were exhausted was unconstitutional. The government abstained at the UN. Executions have all but stopped. Bangladesh is, in practice, drifting towards a moratorium without saying so.

The Middle Ground

Between the two positions lies a set of reforms that both sides might accept. The number of capital offences could be reduced from thirty-three to a handful involving intentional killing, in line with the requirement in international law that the death penalty be reserved for the most serious crimes. Sentences in absentia, of which there were thirty-three in 2025, could be barred from carrying death. Mandatory appellate review with state-funded counsel of quality could be guaranteed. And the government could declare a formal moratorium, retaining the penalty in law while suspending executions, as more than fifty countries have done.

Where the Argument Stands

The debate in Bangladesh has changed shape since 2024. Ten years ago, abolition was barely discussed. Today, the constitutional reform process has considered the question, the courts are narrowing the penalty’s application, and the diplomatic position has softened. What has not changed is public opinion, which surveys and every high-profile crime suggest remains strongly retentionist.

The Honourable does not take a position. We note only that a country with two thousand people on death row and no executions has already made a choice, even if it has not admitted it. The real question is whether that choice should be made openly, by law, rather than quietly, by default.

Sources

1. Amnesty International, Death Sentences and Executions 2025: https://www.amnestyusa.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/Amnesty-International-Global-Report-Death-Sentences-and-Executions-2025.pdf
2. European Union Agency for Asylum, Bangladesh country focus (2025), corporal punishment and death penalty: https://www.euaa.europa.eu/coi/bangladesh/2025/country-focus/5-human-rights-administration-justice/51-corporal-punishment-and-death-penalty
3. World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, UN General Assembly moratorium vote (December 2024): https://worldcoalition.org/two-thirds-of-the-united-nations-general-assembly-vote-in-favor-of-the-10th-resolution-for-a-moratorium-on-the-death-penalty/
4. The Business Standard, Death penalty abolition not feasible in current context: Asif Nazrul tells UN rights chief: https://www.tbsnews.net/bangladesh/death-penalty-abolition-not-feasible-current-context-asif-nazrul-tells-un-rights-chief