A/HRC/27/26 over 300 individuals. Approximately 75 per cent of those cases had involved inaccurate or faulty eyewitness identification. 18. Mr. Bloodsworth discussed other faulty procedures that played a role in wrongful conviction, including the interview process, witness examination, the jury system and physical evidence in criminal cases. He described his ordeal at the Maryland State Penitentiary, where he had lived in a cell in which he could only take three steps from the back wall to the front door; and which was directly under the gas chamber where executions took place. Mr. Bloodsworth told of his efforts to have the death penalty abolished in the United States and to campaign for important reforms to the criminal justice system, such as the Innocence Protection Act of 2003, which included post-conviction DNA testing provisions and ensured the availability of federal funds to states for DNA testing of prisoners who claimed their innocence. In 2012 the State of Maryland had become the eighteenth state to repeal the death penalty in the United States. He emphasized that it was the message of innocence that had made that abolition possible. 19. Ms. Jahangir discussed the position with regard to the use of the death penalty in Asia. She informed the panel that Asia presented a challenge to the death penalty abolitionist movement. The vast majority of executions were carried out in Asia and thousands were under sentence of death there. In 2013, at least 10 countries in Asia had reportedly carried out executions. Because of the secrecy of the death penalty in several countries, the exact number of executions was difficult to obtain. A lack of transparency left the people in those countries without information and prevented debates around that important issue. She emphasized that, in many countries in the region, the death penalty was often imposed after a grossly unfair trial. Even when trials respected international standards of fairness, the risk of innocent people being executed could never be fully eliminated. That was especially worrying, as many criminal legal systems in retentionist countries in Asia were not strong enough to ensure justice and yet retained that irreversible punishment. She noted that crime rates might be reduced by the introduction of better training, human rights education, including for police officers and lawyers, measures to eradicate poverty and programmes to improve general educational attainment, among other measures. She stated that there was no convincing evidence that the death penalty deterred crimes more effectively than other punishments. She also expressed concern that a disproportionate number of individuals on death row in retentionist countries in Asia were from marginalized sections of society. 20. Ms. Jahangir discussed the situation of non-citizens, who were disproportionately affected by the use of the death penalty in the Asian region. Hundreds of migrant workers from supplying nations in Asia were facing the death penalty in other countries. That had led countries which still retained capital punishment, such as India, Indonesia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, to work through diplomatic and other channels to ensure the release of their nationals abroad who were under sentences of death. With regard to positive developments in Asia, Ms. Jahangir said that some Asian countries, including Bhutan, Cambodia, Nepal, the Philippines and Timor-Leste, had abolished the death penalty for all crimes. Brunei Darussalam, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar, the Republic of Korea, Sri Lanka and Thailand had not carried out executions for several years. In Pakistan, the current administration continued to apply a de facto moratorium on the death penalty that had been in place since 2008, except for the execution of a soldier in 2012. She also said that some Asian countries had taken positive steps, including official announcements of a presidential pardon or commutation and court rulings that indicated a gradual reduction in the scope of capital punishment. Some States were currently studying the possibility of abolishing the death penalty. In October 2013, during its second universal periodic review, China had announced that it was reducing the application of the death penalty by taking a series of important measures, including reducing the number of capital crimes, strengthening the role of defence lawyers, ensuring that suspects in capital cases 7