In its work on monitoring the use of the death penalty, ODIHR's aim is to increase transparency in the application of the death penalty and to promote compliance with international safeguards. In addition, the Office facilitates the exchange of information about abolition of the death penalty.
Transparency means that information on the identity of individuals sentenced to death or executed should be made public. In addition, statistics and information on the incidence of death sentences and executions should periodically be made available to the public.
As a forum for participating States to make such information available, ODIHR produces an annual publication entitled The Death Penalty in the OSCE Area, which is usually released at the OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting. This is intended to provide a comparative overview of the use of the death penalty throughout the OSCE region on the basis of information provided by the participating States themselves.
Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe