Just by looking at states’ practices, it can be claimed that there is a progressive tendency towards the abolition of capital punishment. At the beginning of the 20th century, only three states had completely abolished the death penalty, Costa Rica, San Marino, and Venezuela; however, one hundred and thirty-nine countries have abolished it in law or in practice now (“The Death Penalty under International Law” 9). The situation is precisely this: ninety-two countries had abolished capital punishment for all crimes and ten for ordinary crimes; thirty-six had not executed anyone for at least ten years; and fifteen states and the District of Columbia in the US have banned the death penalty. However, there are still fifty-nine countries permitting the death penalty in the world, plus thirty-five states in the US, where the federal law permits it (Epps 13).
On the other hand, the example of Europe, where all states have abolished capital punishment—with the exception of Latvia, where it is allowed only for certain crimes occurring during war time and where nobody has been executed since 1996 (Epps 13)—surely suggests that there is a binding regional custom. Moreover, the Council of Europe and the European Union are strongly opposed to the death penalty; in fact, since mid-1990s, in order to become a member of the Council and of the EU, every country is required to abolish the death penalty (“The Death Penalty under International Law”