The Death Penalty in the OSCE Area–Background Paper 2021 went against the trend towards abolition.211 ODIHR noted with deep concern the sharp increase in federal executions in the United States, highlighting that the death penalty is cruel, inhuman and degrading.212 Moreover, before the first execution was conducted, 1,000 faith leaders, diplomats, legal experts and the EU voiced their opposition to the resumption of federal executions, highlighting its biases and arbitrariness.213 In December 2020, almost 100 criminal justice officials called on the federal government to halt the scheduled executions, and to put an end to the use of capital punishment. 214 This joint statement also highlighted how it was a cruel, ineffective and unjust punishment, affected by racial bias, used against the most vulnerable and how, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, it undermined public safety. The Director of ACLU’s Capital Punishment Project pointed out on the 13th and final federal execution that the majority of executions ordered by the federal government dealt with people who were mentally ill and two Black men for crimes they committed 20 years ago as teenagers, as well as two Black men who always defended their innocence. The statement highlighted the fact that the Supreme Court disregarded lower court findings in many of these cases and stated that the executions were unconstitutional and that the public executions became “super-spreader events, and Terre Haute became the federal prison with the most cases of COVID-19.”215 The discriminatory and arbitrary application of the death penalty As the Death Penalty Information Center noted in its yearly report, in 2020 every prisoner executed, “had one or more significant mental or emotional impairment (mental illness, intellectual disability, brain damage, or chronic trauma).”216 The organization pointed out the failure to respect the entitlement to, “specific measures 211 Aravot, General rapporteur deeply regrets the decision of the US Federal Government to resume executions, 21 July 2021. 212 ODIHR twitter, available at: https://twitter.com/osce_odihr/status/1335864909050105859. 213 Death Penalty Information Center, Op-Eds Highlight Disparities in Federal Death Penalty, as 1,000 Faith Leaders and the European Union Urge Justice Department to Halt Executions, 10 July 2020. 214 Death Penalty Information Center, Prosecutors Call for Ending Federal Executions, 7 December 2020. 215 ACLU, Statement on the 13th and Final Federal Execution, 16 January 2021. 216 Death Penalty Information Center, op. cit., note 177, p. 3. 51