Mohsen Shekari was 23 years old when he was publicly hanged last week by Iranian authorities. His crime was participating in human rights protests against the Iranian regime. In line with Amnesty International, the Iranian government is in search of to execute no less than one other 18 people connected with the demonstrations.
Within the wake of his hanging, all of America’s strongest allies—Britain, France, Spain, Germany, Canada, Ireland—expressed outrage at this human rights atrocity. The Czech president of the European Union described the news as “appalling” and said the Iranian regime uses the death penalty to instill terror in its population.
The official U.S. State Department response was not so full-throated. Why?
On the United Nations this Thursday, Dec. 15, 2022, there’ll likely be a super-majority of 129 nations voting in favor of the bi-annual U.N. resolution calling for a worldwide abolition of the death penalty. All of America’s European allies, every country within the Western Hemisphere and a fast-increasing variety of African nations will likely be amongst this super-majority.
This may not be the primary time America voted with Iran, Saudi Arabia and North Korea to uphold the practice of presidency killings of its residents.
Only 33 nations will likely be voting to maintain using the death penalty. Amongst those nations will likely be: Iran, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, China and—contrary to President Biden’s policy at home—the USA of America.
This may not be the primary time America voted with Iran, Saudi Arabia and North Korea to uphold the practice of presidency killings of its residents. Under each President Obama and President Trump, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. voted with these brutal regimes on this same issue.
But this yr there’s hope for a change.
President Biden is now the primary person in U.S. history to be elected president with a publicly stated position that the death penalty should abolished. He has courageously put a halt to federal executions in the USA. President Biden can also be boldly advancing a criminal justice reform agenda for our country; an agenda that seeks to handle the racial disparities which have too often been perpetuated in our criminal justice system given our country’s legacy of slavery.
Two years after his election to the presidency, it’s time for Mr. Biden to bring our U.N. vote into alignment with the principles and policies upon which he was elected.
A majority of states in the USA have now repealed or placed a moratorium on using the death penalty. My very own state of Maryland was the primary state south of the Mason-Dixon Line to repeal the death penalty, in 2013; we were followed last yr by Virginia. As President Biden has himself stated, the death penalty is pricey, it doesn’t work as a deterrent, and it has never and might never be fairly or flawlessly applied under any human system of justice.
Why then would President Biden—who has done a lot to repair America’s alliances abroad—have us side with Iran, Saudi Arabia and North Korea in voting for continued use of the death penalty on the earth?
There really isn’t any good reason.
Certainly one of the core principles of Catholic social justice teaching is a belief within the dignity of every body. Catholic teaching also affirms the common good we share with our fellow residents and the solidarity we share with souls past, present and future.
It’s time for America to stop giving political cover on the world stage to Iranian and Saudi executions.