Burkina Faso’s Parliament Unanimously Votes to Reinstate the Death Penalty

ASSOCIATED PRESS

12:53 PM EDT, October 21, 2026

The parliament in the Western African Sahel nation of Burkina Faso has reinstated the death penalty for crimes including terrorism, espionage and treason.

All 71 members of the Burkina Faso legislature voted unanimously in favor of adopting the new penal code on Tuesday, according to the justice minister, Edasso Rodrigue Bayala.

The development ends the abolition of the death penalty, which had been in effect since 2018 under the previous and democratically elected president, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré. Interim president Ibrahim Traoré has held power in the West African nation since a 2022 coup.

The last known execution in Burkina Faso took place in 1988, according to Human Rights Watch, which condemned the change.

“The failure of the death penalty as a crime deterrent has been globally acknowledged and the military junta in Burkina Faso should maintain the prohibition on its use,” senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch Ilaria Allegrozzi told The Associated Press.

The ruling Council of Ministers approved a bill reinstating capital punishment in December, prompting a backlash from human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, which criticized the move as repressive and an effort to suppress dissent.

The military junta has been accused of trying to crush dissent by detaining human rights defenders and journalists and dissolving all political parties.

Authorities have also banned media outlets, suspended unions and civil society groups, forced the United Nations human rights agency to leave the country, and subjected critics to unlawful conscription, torture and disappearances, according to Allegrozzi.

Landlocked Burkina Faso, a country of 23 million people, is grappling with a security crisis as authorities battle militant groups linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group.

Both government forces and militants from Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, an al-Qaida-aligned group, have been accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity. A Human Rights Watch report this year said government forces killed twice as many civilians as jihadis did between 2023 and 2025.

“Reinstating the death penalty won’t solve the security crisis in Burkina Faso. It will only add to the already appalling toll that President Traoré’s counterterrorism campaign has exacted on the Burkinabè people since he seized power,” Allegrozzi said.