US nitrogen execution draws global criticism

The southern US state of Alabama put to death a convicted murderer using nitrogen gas, the first time the country has used a method that has drawn global criticism.

Kenneth Eugene Smith was pronounced dead at 8:25 pm (0225 GMT Friday), according to the state attorney general.

"Justice has been served. Tonight, Kenneth Smith was put to death for the heinous act he committed over 35 years ago," the statement by Attorney General Steve Marshall said.

Smith, 58, was on death row for more than three decades after being convicted of the 1988 murder-for-hire of a pastor's wife. He was put to death at Holman Prison in Atmore, Alabama by nitrogen hypoxia, which involved pumping nitrogen gas into a facemask, causing him to suffocate.

The EU said it "deeply regrets" the execution of a convicted murderer in the US state of Alabama by nitrogen gas.

"According to leading experts, this method is a particularly cruel and unusual punishment," a European Union spokesman said in a statement on Friday.

The 27-nation EU has a blanket opposition to the death penalty and regularly criticised executions carried out around the globe.

Meanwhile, UN human rights chief Volker Turk said the execution of a convicted murderer in the US by nitrogen gas suffocation could amount to torture.

"I deeply regret the execution of Kenneth Eugene Smith in Alabama despite serious concerns this novel and untested method of suffocation by nitrogen gas may amount to torture, or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment," Turk said in a brief statement.

The last US execution using gas was in 1999 when a convicted murderer was put to death using hydrogen cyanide gas.

There were 24 executions in the United States in 2023, all of them carried out by lethal injection.

Alabama is one of three US states that have approved the use of nitrogen hypoxia as a method of execution, along with Oklahoma and Mississippi.