China has halved its executions since 2007, when its high court began reviewing death row cases, but still puts around 4,000 people to death every year, a US campaign group said Tuesday. The exact number of people executed in China every year is a state secret, but according to Amnesty International, the country puts more people to death than the rest of the world put together. The rare data, compiled by San Francisco-based campaign group Dui Hua, is partly based on a claim by a Chinese legal scholar at the quasi-governmental think tank, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, that executions have been halved. Dui Hua Executive Director John Kamm said the figure, which is nearly eight times the 527 Amnesty International says were executed outside China in 2010 – was still far too high.
Beijing has taken measures in recent years to rein in the use of capital punishment, including requiring the country’s supreme court to review all such sentences before they are carried out. Most executions are imposed for violent crimes such as murder and robbery, state media have said, but drug trafficking and some corruption cases are also punishable by death. Earlier this year, China eliminated capital punishment for some economic crimes, including tax fraud. The amendment also exempted from capital punishment anyone over the age of 75 at the time of trial, unless they had committed murder “with exceptional cruelty”.