Amnesty International has published a report detailing death sentences and executions carried out around the world in 2013.
China far and away topped the world in the number of executions it carried out. Although the exact number is a state secret, it is estimated that it was in the thousands. In 2013, China executed more people than the rest of the world combined.
Behind Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia, the U.S. came in fourth for executions, with nearly half of them taking place in Texas.
Public executions and executions of political opponents are common in North Korea, but Amnesty International was not able to determine how many took place.
Globally, there was a reported 15% increase in executions in 2013 over 2012, mostly due to an increase of executions in Iran and Iraq. Despite these setbacks, Amnesty International maintains that the international trend is towards abolition of the death penalty.
The number of countries that have abolished the death penalty has been steadily climbing since 2004:
