the number of people sentenced to death in the United States and the number executed fell again in 2004, according to the latest government figures.

Steven Van McHone was executed by lethal injection in the early morning for the 1990 shooting deaths of his mother and stepfather.

an Iranian man convicted of murder was hanged in a prison in the central city of Isfahan.

two young men were hanged in a public square in the northern city of Gorgan after being found guilty of lavat, or homosexual relationship, the daily Kayhan reported.

a Nigerian Islamic Sharia court sentenced two men to death by hanging for killing and sexually abusing a three-year old girl.

the Pentagon said the United States would not seek the death penalty against any of the five Guantanamo Bay prisoners it had announced charges against on November 7.

Saudi Arabia executed Saudi national Saeed al-Qahtani in the southern town of Khamis Mushayt.

Charles Daniel Thacker, a man convicted of strangling a schoolteacher during a sexual assault in 1993, was executed by lethal injection.

a Chinese man who was tortured into a false confession, jailed for nearly two years and wrongly sentenced to death was suing two local law courts for compensation.

a young man was publicly hanged in the northern Iranian town of Sari, a semi-official daily reported.

Canadian diplomats sought a promise from the Pentagon that it would not seek to execute a teenager being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Thai police arrested Italian national Daniel Testoni, 22, accused of having stabbed to death Japanese businessman Marcio Cristiano Hiraoka.