Bacre Waly Ndiaye, a lawyer and death penalty expert from Senegal, concluded in his 54-page report that capital punishment as administered in the U.S. operates outside international standards. Lack of adequate counsel and legal representation for many capital defendants is disturbing. The imposition of death sentences in the United States seems to continue to be marked by arbitrariness. Race, ethnic origin and economic status appear to be key determinants of who will and who will not receive a sentence of death. The report, issued in Geneva at the annual meeting of the U.N Commission on Human Rights, is one of a series of U.N. evaluations of civil liberties and rule of law in countries around the world.
Most reports focus on well-known human rights violators such as Iran, Iraq and China.
But, periodically, the U.N. sends an investigator to a democratic nation. Many of Ndiaye's observations echo those of death penalty critics in the United States, but the report places the discussion in an international context. Few other industrial democracies retain the death penalty, and while executions are declining elsewhere around the world, they are on the rise in the United States, even among juvenile defendants, the mentally impaired and women, Ndiaye reported. The criticism also comes as the U.S. is urging the U.N., and Mary Robinson, its new high commissioner for human rights, to take a tougher line on civil liberties violations around the world. The statement also denied that U.S. practices are at variance with international law or treaties.