China
Death penalty and prisoners' rights · Archive since 1999
Data card
- Legal status
- Retentionist
- Executions recorded in 2026
- 0
- Executions recorded in 2025
- 0
- First news item in the archive
- JANUARY 1, 1999 · In January, the Nanyang Intermediate People's Court...
- News items in the archive
- 2,796
Source: Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026.
China is classified as Retentionist in the Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026. In 2026 the association recorded 0 executions in the country, against 0 the year before. The archive holds 2,796 news items on China, from 1999 to today.
China is believed to carry out more executions than any other country, but the figure is a state secret: no official statistics exist, and the known cases are those reported by the press or heard in public trials. Capital punishment applies to a large number of offences, including economic and drug offences, and the system also provides for a death sentence with a two year suspension, which in practice is often converted into life imprisonment.
The news on this page is a small part of what happens, and it is the part that can be documented.
Latest news
- JUNE 27, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Shenyang Municipal Intermediate People's Court...
The Shenyang Municipal Intermediate People's Court decreed the death penalty on Liu Futian who sold 810 grams of heroin and made an illegal gain of 105,600 yuan
- JUNE 26, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Tan Huijun, Li Changxing, Duan Faxiang, Jiang Zhidong,...
Tan Huijun, Li Changxing, Duan Faxiang, Jiang Zhidong, Pu Shaogang, Wang Wenfu, Zhu Bixun and Zhu Jiazeng were executed in Baise City and Guigang City in Guangxi because they were found guilty of involvement in four drug-related cases
- JUNE 26, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Four major drug criminals who had been sentenced to...
Four major drug criminals who had been sentenced to death by the intermediate courts in Xian and Baoji and whose death sentences had been approved by the Supreme People's Court, were executed in the two cities
- JUNE 26, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Wuhan Intermediate People's Court ordered the execution...
The Wuhan Intermediate People's Court ordered the execution of eight drug traffickers including Wang Yan (female), Jin Xiaoli (female), Yang Hansheng, Sun Weiyu, Tao Yaocong, Chen Manchun, Wang Weiping, and Wang Zhanping
- JUNE 26, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Shanghai Nmber2 Intermediate Court executed the...
The Shanghai Nmber2 Intermediate Court executed the death penalty on two convicted drug traffickers: 36-year old Ma Fenghua and Ma Wenzhong who werefounf guilty of trafficking 5,250 grams of heroin
- JUNE 26, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Kunming Municipal Intermediate People's Court handed...
The Kunming Municipal Intermediate People's Court handed down death sentences to Ma Xueyun, a drug trafficker, drug smugglers Yan Zai, Ying Han and Sai Yan Shan, the latter two of Burmese nationality, and drug transporters Li Jie and Gong Xiaoying
- JUNE 26, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
China executed tens of drug traffickers in a synchronised...
China executed tens of drug traffickers in a synchronised operation to dramatise its seriousness about fighting drug-related crime and to mark the International Anti-Drug Day
- JUNE 26, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Chongqing Number One Intermediate People's Court sentenced...
Chongqing Number One Intermediate People's Court sentenced 24 alleged drug traffickers to death, the Chongqing Daily reported
- JUNE 25, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Beijing Number One and Number Two Intermediate People's...
Beijing Number One and Number Two Intermediate People's Courts pronounced death sentences on seven drug traffickers including Zhuang Yuntong, Zhao Peiqing, Ma Zuoqing, Yuan Yuehong, female and Xinjiang female vagrant A-Yi-Gu-Li Yu-Su-Fu
- JUNE 25, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Guangzhou Intermediate People's Court held a hearing...
The Guangzhou Intermediate People's Court held a hearing to try Wu Man, 40, and reiterated that the Chinese mainland has the right to arrest and interrogate him
- JUNE 24, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Hunan People's Courts at different levels in a...
The Hunan People's Courts at different levels in a united action, ordered the executions of 154 drug traffickers and smugglers
- JUNE 23, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Chengdu Municipal Intermediate People's Court sentenced...
The Chengdu Municipal Intermediate People's Court sentenced Li Ming and ten others (unnamed) to death; Liu Gang and seven others were sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve
- JUNE 23, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Guangzhou Railway Communications Intermediate People's...
The Guangzhou Railway Communications Intermediate People's Court carried out the instructions of the Guangdong Higher People's Court to execute drug criminals Li Qing, Zhang Kaida, and Huang Hongying
- JUNE 23, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Seven drug traffickers were executed in Beijing for...
Seven drug traffickers were executed in Beijing for being involved in five drug trafficking cases between 1997 and 1999
- JUNE 23, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The southwest Chinese province of Sichuan destroyed...
The southwest Chinese province of Sichuan destroyed 20 kilograms of "drugs" in the provincial capital Chengdu as part of a local narcotics crackdown
- JUNE 23, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Hu Zhongwang, 23, and Hu Luobing, of Hubei province,...
Hu Zhongwang, 23, and Hu Luobing, of Hubei province, were executed in Dongguan City in south China's Guangdong province
- JUNE 22, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
An [unidentified] 36-year-old hacker was sentenced...
An [unidentified] 36-year-old hacker was sentenced to death in Hangzhou for embezzling over 1m yuan of public money from a bank account
- JUNE 22, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Shanghai Railway Transport Intermediate Court sentenced...
The Shanghai Railway Transport Intermediate Court sentenced to death seven people with a period of reprieve or life imprisonment
- JUNE 22, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Yibin Municipal Intermediate People's Court sentenced...
The Yibin Municipal Intermediate People's Court sentenced Ma Haijian, Zhu Qinglin, Zhu Qingmin, Qu Zhi'an and Tang Yongcai to death while Wang Shiyun and Xu Yanpu were sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve
- JUNE 22, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Regional Higher People's Court announced that eight...
The Regional Higher People's Court announced that eight of the 13 defendants involved in a drug case were executed
- JUNE 21, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Hubei Province Higher People's Court sentenced...
The Hubei Province Higher People's Court sentenced Zhou Mingrong to death with a two year reprieve
- JUNE 20, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Zulikar Memet, a man accused of helping separatist...
Zulikar Memet, a man accused of helping separatist ethnic Turkic Uighurs, was secretly executed after being held in isolation since his arrest in mid-1998
- JUNE 16, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Guangzhou Municipal Intermediate People's Court...
The Guangzhou Municipal Intermediate People's Court sentenced Zhu Zexin, alias Zhang Xiong, to death with a two-year reprieve
- JUNE 16, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Jinzhou Municipal Intermediate People's Court announced...
The Jinzhou Municipal Intermediate People's Court announced its judgment on the extraordinary case of mass murder in the coal pits in Yi County, Liaoning
- JUNE 16, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
The Intermediate Court of the Ziyang Prefecture, Sichuan,...
The Intermediate Court of the Ziyang Prefecture, Sichuan, sentenced six backbone members of a criminal gang, including Zhang Yi, to death
- JUNE 16, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Hong Kong officials were seeking a guarantee from Beijing...
Hong Kong officials were seeking a guarantee from Beijing that mainlanders sent back to face trial under a rendition agreement would not be executed
- JUNE 15, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Five men, Xiaokelaiti Makmuti, Maimaiti Turxun, Kader...
Five men, Xiaokelaiti Makmuti, Maimaiti Turxun, Kader Asker Zunong, Abduriyimu Maimaitiyimin, Adbunur Abulimuti, all ethnic Turkic Uighurs native to the region, accused of terrorist activities in the far northern Chinese region of Xinjiang were executed i
- JUNE 14, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
A Zhanjiang court sentenced to death Zhang Zhenlian,...
A Zhanjiang court sentenced to death Zhang Zhenlian, 40, for issuing 72 copies of false value added specialized tax invoices with a total value of 175m yuan involving taxes of 29
- JUNE 14, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Vice-Minister of Justice Duan Zhengkun said that since...
Vice-Minister of Justice Duan Zhengkun said that since China introduced its legal aid system in late 1996, 400,000 disadvantaged people, have benefited from the government-funded programmes
- JUNE 13, 2000ChinaDEATH PENALTY
Fang Yong, 35, who hid in Canada for nine years, was...
Fang Yong, 35, who hid in Canada for nine years, was given the death penalty by the Ningbo People's Intermediate Court for embezzling about 1