A coalition of rights organizations on Wednesday issued a joint statement urging the Maldives to reconsider proposed legislative amendments that would reinstate the death penalty for drug trafficking, citing concerns that the punishment is archaic, inhumane, and runs contrary to international human rights standards.

The nine organizations expressed alarm after Dr. Mohamed Muizzu, President of the Republic of the Maldives, announced that he had instructed a review of proposed amendments to the Drug Act (No.17/2011), aimed at introducing the death penalty for those convicted of smuggling or trafficking narcotics. First tabled in Parliament in December 2024, the bill is part of the government’s stated push to strengthen punitive measures in its crackdown on the illicit drug trade. The move follows a sharp rise in reported drug cases, with a 2023 Maldives Bureau of Statistics report recording over 50,000 drug-related arrests between 2016 and 2023, alongside a marked increase in opiate-positive tests.

While the country’s growing crime rate, driven in part by the drug trade, has heightened public pressure for tougher measures, rights groups argue that the Maldives, as state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), would be acting in clear breach of its obligations by introducing the death penalty. They contend that such a policy is in direct contravention with Article 6(6) of the ICCPR, which affirms the goal of abolition, and is fundamentally incompatible with the duty to protect the right to life. In its guidance to states that have not abolished the death penalty, the United Nations has emphasized that while the right to life is not absolute, any justification for its deprivation must be interpreted with the utmost strictness.

The UN maintains that capital punishment should be applied, if at all, only in cases involving crimes of the most exceptional gravity, such as intentional killing, and that expanding it to lesser offenses undermines international human rights standards and risks arbitrary deprivation of life. Prima facie, the offense of drug trafficking, although morally and legally incomprehensible, does not breach this threshold for determining whether the death penalty should be imposed or not. The notion that the death penalty would lead to a safer society by acting as an effective deterrent is an outdated one, with there being no legitimate basis as to why it should be integrated into a democratic legal system to tackle the issue of drug trafficking.

The death penalty often targets vulnerable low-level couriers such as drug mules while leaving the masterminds untouched. Eradicating the drug trade requires a top-down approach that prosecutes and jails kingpins, as focusing on subordinates only emboldens those in charge to continue their operations.