Pakistan
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 December 1998, the Government set up military trial...
- News items in the archive
- 2,105
Source: Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026.
Pakistan 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 2,105 news items on Pakistan, from 1999 to today.
In Pakistan the death penalty applies to a very wide list of offences, from murder to terrorism to blasphemy, and the method is hanging. The country observed a de facto moratorium for some years, broken after the attack on the school in Peshawar in 2014.
Pakistan's death row is among the most populated in the world. The archive follows executions, sentences, appeals and the cases of people with mental disabilities.
Latest news
- JANUARY 1, 1999PakistanDEATH PENALTY
In 1997, the Nawaz Sharif Government introduced the...
In 1997, the Nawaz Sharif Government introduced the death penalty for rapists charged with attacking children under 10 years, and said such cases should be tried in the special courts set up under the anti-terrorism laws
- JANUARY 1, 1999PakistanDEATH PENALTY
The Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or...
The Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions has learned that large scale violations to the right to life are continuing to occur in Pakistan (E/CN
- JANUARY 1, 1999PakistanDEATH PENALTY
The death penalty is imposed for several crimes, including...
The death penalty is imposed for several crimes, including robbery, hijacking, arms trading, drug trafficking, rape, and capital offenses, under Shari'a Law, introduced with governmental decrees, such as sexual relations between partners not married to ea
- JANUARY 1, 1999PakistanDEATH PENALTY
In the capital Islamabad, Senate opposition leader...
In the capital Islamabad, Senate opposition leader Aitzaz Ahsan asked President Rafiq Tarar, in a letter, to refrain from sending to the gallows people sentenced by military courts until the Supreme Court had ruled on their validity
- JANUARY 1, 1999PakistanDEATH PENALTY
In January, former Senator and Millat Party General...
In January, former Senator and Millat Party General Secretary Javed Jabbar criticized the first death sentence passed by a military trial court in Karachi on Ashraf Chakar, 30, who was hanged on December 31, 1998