Zimbabwe abolishes death penalty almost 20 years after its last hanging

Associated Press

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Zimbabwe has abolished the death penalty, a widely expected move in a country that last carried out the punishment nearly two decades ago. President Emmerson Mnangagwa once faced the death penalty himself in the 1960s during the war of independence. He approved the law this week after a bill passed through Parliament. Zimbabwe has about 60 prisoners on death row, and the new law spares them. The country last executed someone in 2005, partly because at one point no one was willing to take up the job of state executioner.