Executing justice

By The Data Team

ON APRIL 29th Indonesia executed eight people convicted of drug trafficking. Despite concerns over legal failings and the mental health of one prisoner, four Nigerians, two Australians, a Brazilian and an Indonesian were put to death by firing squad. A ninth, a Filipina, was granted a surprise last-minute reprieve. Australia, which had appealed for clemency and had offered to pay for the prison costs of its citizens, promptly withdrew its ambassador in protest. This brings the number of people executed in Indonesia to 14 this year (12 of whom were foreigners), after the new president Joko Widodo lifted a moratorium on the death penalty for drug offences in December, citing a "national emergency". Until then, as the chart shows, Indonesia had not been among the world's most enthusiastic practitioners of the death penalty: between 2007 and 2014, only 16 people had been executed.