Universal Periodic Review Working Group – 40th Session

Universal Periodic Review of Zimbabwe

Statement by Australia

26 January 2022

Thank you, [President/Vice President]

Australia welcomes Zimbabwe’s continuing approach towards the death penalty which has remained abolitionist in practice. 

Australia recommends that Zimbabwe:

1. Take all necessary steps to ensure free and fair Presidential and Parliamentary elections in 2023, including facilitating access to identity documentation and voter registration.
2. Take all necessary steps to ensure civil society actors and human rights defenders can operate freely without fear of intimidation or reprisals.
3. Ensure that allegations of human rights abuses are promptly and transparently investigated and perpetrators held to account.  
4. Impose an official moratorium on the death penalty with immediate effect, commute all existing death sentences to terms of imprisonment, and abolish the death penalty in national legislation.
5. Repeal all laws and policies discriminating against LGBTI persons and amend laws to ensure their rights and freedoms are safeguarded.

[137 Words (less than 180 words)]