The European Union regrets that the State of South Carolina in United States of America has resumed its use of capital punishment, after 13 years, with the execution of Freddie Eugene Owens on 20 September. South Carolina now re-joins a small group of US states that continue to rely on this inhuman and degrading punishment. The State has also expanded its execution methods to include firing squads and electrocution, practices that have no place in today´s society.

The EU strongly opposes capital punishment at all times and in all circumstances. The death penalty is incompatible with the inalienable right to life and is a cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment that fails to act as deterrent to crime and makes miscarriages of justice irreversible. Furthermore, rehabilitation as an objective of modern criminal law is rendered impossible by the application of capital punishment.

To date, 200 or more innocent people have been exonerated from death row in the United States. The EU continues to call for the universal abolition of the death penalty and for States that still maintain it, to implement a moratorium and move towards abolition, in line with the worldwide trend.