Lebanon - August 2026

On 11 August, Parliament approved legislation abolishing the death penalty for all crimes and replacing existing death sentences with life imprisonment, making Lebanon the first country in the region to formally abolish capital punishment. The reform was widely welcomed by human rights organizations as a landmark step toward strengthening the protection of the right to life. Although a de facto moratorium on executions had been maintained since 2004, the death penalty remained on the statute books for offences including murder and treason, and 85 people were still under sentence of death as of January 2026.

Sources: L’Orient Le Jour, Reuters, Amnesty International