On 28 May 2013, Papua New Guinea repealed

On 28 May 2013, Papua New Guinea repealed its controversial Sorcery Act but expanded its use of the death penalty in certain cases.
The Parliament voted to reinstate the death penalty for crimes such as aggravated rape, sorcery-related killings and robbery with violence.
The Criminal Code Act (Amendment Bill 2013), which was passed on a voice vote, repealed the Sorcery Act 1971, which had criminalised witchcraft and allowed suspicions of sorcery to be used as a defence in murder trials. Killings connected with sorcery will now be treated as wilful murder and the penalty is death.
Aggravated rape is defined as rape using dangerous weapons or rape in the company of one or more persons or where grievous bodily harm is caused and where the victim is a child under 10 years.
Parliament also amended section 597 of the Criminal Code Act, allowing for a number of modes of execution: hanging, lethal injection, "medical death by deprivation of oxygen", firing squad and electrocution. The method of execution is to be determined by the cabinet. Previously, PNG legislation did not set out detailed procedures for executions. The Criminal Code provided that the death penalty “shall be carried out by hanging the offender by his neck until he is dead.”
The vote followed a string of gruesome "witch" killings and gang rapes. In February 2013, a 20-year-old mother accused of sorcery was burned alive in a village market. Two months later, a woman accused of black magic was beheaded. In April, a 32-year-old U.S. academic was gang-raped by a group of men as she walked with her husband in a forest on Karkar Island, an attack condemned as a "cowardly act of animals" by Prime Minister Peter O'Neill.
Daniel Korimbao, a spokesman for Mr. O’Neill, said in a statement that the decision to reinstate capital punishment was difficult but ultimately necessary to combat a culture of lawlessness and violence in the country. “These are very tough penalties, but they reflect the seriousness of the nature of the crimes and the demand by the community for Parliament to act,” he said.
Papua New Guinea's Attorney-General said the reintroduction of the death penalty is not a magic pill that will solve the country's law and order problems. It is a courageous move but a whole of government approach will be needed to restore law and order, Attorney-General Kerenga Kua said.
Prior to the amendment, the Criminal Code Act provided capital punishment only for murder, treason and piracy.
The Defence Forces Act also provides for the death penalty.
The death penalty for wilful murder was abolished in 1970, but in August 1991 the Parliament re-introduced it through an amendment to the Criminal Code, once again in response to a worsening law and order situation, including a rising rate of violent crime, in particular rape and murder. The decision to amend the law stated that the death penalty for wilful murder should not be mandatory, but should be at the discretion of the judge.
In the twenty years prior to 1991, the Criminal Code already provided for the death penalty for treason, piracy with violence and attempted piracy with personal violence. However, it was never imposed for these crimes, nor were there any executions for wilful murder after 1954.
In 1993, the public prosecutor issued guidelines to judges on the imposition of the death penalty in cases of wilful murder, and in 1995, the courts imposed the first death sentence.
Exact figures on the number of people executed prior to 1954 are not available, although it is known that at least 67 people were executed by hanging under the Australian, British and German colonial administrations of PNG between the two world wars.
According to the Attorney General, as of 28 January 2013, 10 people were under death sentence in Papua New Guinea.
On 20 December 2012, Papua New Guinea abstained from the Resolution on a Moratorium on the Use of the Death Penalty at the UN General Assembly.