[3] Eritrea's last execution took place in 1989, four years before the nation declared independence from Ethiopia and gained international recognition.
The New York Times reported in 1989 on the execution of General Demessie Bulto, who had attempted a coup against Ethiopian President Mengistu Haile Mariam, and was put to death by junior officers in Asmara on 19 May 1989.
[1] In 2019, the Eritrean Delegation at the United Nations Human Rights Committee stated, "There was no consensus in the country on the abolition of the death penalty."
The Human Rights Committee noted that there was no official moratorium on the death penalty in place in Eritrea; they recommended that the country implement an official moratorium and become signatories to the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which concerns global abolition of the death penalty.
[6] The Constitution of Eritrea, which was ratified in on 23 May 1997, permits the death penalty, as it states, "[no] person shall be deprived of life without due process of law."