Lebanon's parliament voted to abolish the death penalty.
On Tuesday, August 11, Lebanon's parliament approved a bill abolishing the death penalty. A majority of 128 members voted in favor of the bill. The Hezbollah bloc did not support it, according to the Associated Press.
The Lebanese Parliament has voted to abolish the death penalty. The country's capital punishment will now be replaced by life imprisonment, including forced labor. Lebanon has become the first country in the Middle East to abolish the death penalty.
Lebanese Justice Minister Adel Nassar described this decision as a "historic step." He noted that the death penalty in Lebanon previously created difficulties in extraditing suspects from countries where it is prohibited.
According to available data, the last execution in Lebanon was in January 2004. Since then, an informal moratorium on executions has been in effect in the country, although courts continued to hand down death sentences, which were subsequently either suspended or commuted.