Vietnam Moves to Cut Death Penalty to Four Crimes

The Vietnamese government has formally proposed narrowing the application of the death penalty from the current ten capital offenses to just four, a move that continues a decade-long trajectory of penal reform in the Socialist Republic. The draft revision to the Penal Code was presented to the National Assembly on Thursday, August 20, 2026, by Minister of Public Security General Luong Tam Quang, who delivered the government’s official submission at the legislature’s first extraordinary session of the year.

Under the proposed amendments, six offenses would be removed from the capital punishment list: rioting; rape of a person under 16; illegal trading in narcotic substances; crimes against humanity; war crimes; and terrorism aimed at opposing the people’s administration, the latter of which is expected to be merged with the existing offense of terrorism. If the National Assembly approves the revisions, the death penalty would remain applicable to only four crimes: treason, murder, terrorism, and the illegal production of narcotics.

The proposal aligns with the Communist Party’s long-stated policy of gradually restricting the scope of capital punishment, yet it also raises questions about the balance between progressive reform and the state’s desire to retain robust deterrents for offenses deemed threatening to national security or social order.

The Trajectory of Reform: From 44 Offenses to Four

The current proposal is not an isolated initiative but rather the latest step in a sustained reduction of capital offenses that has spanned four decades. According to reporting from Tuoi Tre, the 1985 Penal Code contained 44 offenses punishable by death. That number fell to 29 in the 1999 Code, 22 in the 2009 Code, 18 in the 2015 Code, and ten under the current version, which took effect on July 1, 2025. The proposed revision would bring the total down to four, a reduction of over 90 percent from the original 1985 baseline.

This trajectory accelerated notably last year, when the National Assembly removed the death penalty for eight criminal offenses: embezzlement, bribe taking, espionage, illegally transporting narcotics, sabotaging state infrastructure, and crimes aimed at overthrowing the people’s government. Those changes had a tangible and highly publicized consequence: the life of real estate tycoon Truong My Lan was spared. Lan had been sentenced to death in 2024 for her role in a $12 billion corruption scandal, one of the largest financial frauds in Vietnamese history. Following the 2025 amendments, her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment, as the maximum penalty for her crimes is now life in prison.

Last year, Minister of Justice Nguyen Hai Ninh explained the rationale behind the shift, stating that the decision to reduce the use of the death penalty “was based on careful analysis of the nature and severity of the offenses, the value of the interests protected, and the potential for remedying the harm caused.” This framing suggests a deliberate effort to align Vietnamese criminal law with international human rights norms while maintaining a pragmatic approach to public security.

What the Draft Also Tightens

While the headline change is the reduction in capital offenses, the draft revision contains several provisions that complicate any simple narrative of liberalization. The Ministry of Public Security has simultaneously moved to increase punishments for certain acts deemed to “infringe upon the interests of the state,” as defined under Article 331(2) of the Penal Code, and for acts that “aim to oppose the Communist Party of Vietnam,” under Article 117. Both provisions are notoriously vague and have been used liberally against government critics, journalists, and civil society activists in recent years.

The draft also criminalizes offenses against the Communist Party’s hammer-and-sickle flag, punishable by up to three years in prison — a signal that the state remains vigilant in protecting its ideological symbols even as it narrows the scope of capital punishment.

Further, the draft exempts police, armed forces, and paramilitary self-defense forces from criminal liability for acts committed while carrying out official duties — a provision that legal scholars and human rights advocates warn could shield excessive use of force committed under the guise of official operations.

At the same time, the draft adds nine new criminal offenses — including establishing or participating in an organized crime group, plus crimes relating to economic management, cybersecurity, high technology, the environment, public safety, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. It would double fines and monetary thresholds for criminal liability, expand non-custodial reform for ten offenses, and broaden exemptions from criminal liability in the research and controlled testing of new technologies, as well as for national defense and security duties.

Legislative Hurdles and Committee Caution

The proposal now faces a rigorous legislative review process. The National Assembly is expected to debate the revisions in the coming weeks, with a vote scheduled for its second session in October 2026. If passed, the new Penal Code is expected to take effect on March 1, 2027.

Phan Chi Hieu, Chairman of the National Assembly’s Committee on Legal and Judicial Affairs, presented the appraisal report to the legislature. The committee expressed support for the continued reduction in the number of offenses punishable by death, but many committee members called for careful consideration of abolishing the death penalty for four specific offenses: illegal drug trafficking, rape of a person under 16, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. Hieu stressed that the issue “should be carefully assessed to avoid undermining the deterrent and preventive effectiveness of criminal law.” He added, “This is aimed at avoiding adverse impacts on the effectiveness of crime deterrence, prevention and handling, and must be considered in relation to the dangerous nature of the offences.”

The committee’s caution reflects a broader tension within the Vietnamese establishment between reformers seeking to modernize the legal system and conservatives prioritizing state security. Drug trafficking and child rape are viewed by many lawmakers as particularly heinous, and there is concern that removing the death penalty for them could be perceived as lenient by the public.

General Luong Tam Quang, in presenting the government’s submission, framed the revision as a matter of policy coherence and international standing. He stated that “narrowing the scope institutionalises the Party’s policy, is in line with progressive legislative trends, and enhances Viet Nam’s position in international cooperation on criminal justice, extradition and mutual legal assistance.” At the same time, he affirmed that the Ministry of Public Security remains determined to maintain strong sanctions for the most serious offenses.

The Korea Comparison: Two Paths, One Destination?

The Vietnamese proposal invites a natural comparison with South Korea, which occupies a unique position in the global debate on capital punishment. South Korea is a de facto abolitionist state: no executions have been carried out since December 1997, and an informal moratorium has been in place since President Kim Dae-jung took office in 1998. However, capital punishment remains on the books, and approximately 59 individuals were on death row as of 2023. An abolition bill introduced in the National Assembly in 2015 failed to pass, reflecting the persistent political sensitivity of the issue.

The two countries thus present contrasting approaches to the same underlying question. South Korea has achieved abolition in practice through executive restraint and judicial caution, without formally amending its criminal code. Vietnam, by contrast, is pursuing abolition through legislative action, systematically reducing the statutory list of capital offenses while retaining the penalty for a core set of crimes. Both approaches reflect a gradualist strategy, but they differ in their institutional mechanisms and political symbolism.

For South Korea, the moratorium has become a de facto constitutional norm, even as conservative politicians periodically call for resuming executions in response to high-profile crimes. For Vietnam, the narrowing of the death penalty is part of a broader project of legal modernization, driven by the Party’s resolutions on judicial reform and the construction of a socialist rule-of-law state. The Vietnamese approach is more formalized and more explicitly tied to international legal cooperation, particularly in the areas of extradition and mutual legal assistance.

Regional and Scholarly Assessment

The Vietnamese proposal must also be understood within the broader Southeast Asian context. Vietnam is not alone in reconsidering the death penalty, but its trajectory is distinctive. While countries like Singapore and Malaysia retain robust capital punishment regimes, Vietnam has moved steadily toward restriction. The proposed reduction to four offenses would place Vietnam among the more progressive jurisdictions in the region, at least in terms of statutory scope.

Human Rights Watch’s Elaine Pearson offered a cautionary note in a statement earlier this month, observing that “Vietnam’s criminal laws need to be revised to become more protective of people’s rights, not to facilitate greater abuse by the police.” This critique highlights the dual nature of the current draft: while it narrows the death penalty, it simultaneously expands state power in other areas, including the criminalization of offenses against state symbols and the exemption of security forces from criminal liability.

From a scholarly perspective, the draft represents a strategic recalibration: the reduction in capital offenses aligns with international human rights standards and enhances Vietnam’s credibility in legal cooperation, while the expansion of vaguely defined national security offenses and immunity provisions suggests the reform is not purely humanitarian in intent.

The coming months will be critical. The National Assembly’s October vote will determine whether the proposed reductions survive legislative scrutiny, particularly the contentious removal of the death penalty for drug trafficking and child rape — provisions the committee’s appraisal report has already signaled face significant opposition. If the assembly retains capital punishment for some of these offenses, the final code may represent a compromise rather than the full realization of the government’s proposal.

Regardless of the outcome, the trajectory is clear: Vietnam is moving, albeit cautiously and unevenly, toward a narrower application of the death penalty. The question is no longer whether the scope will be reduced, but how far and how fast. For scholars of Korean and Southeast Asian criminal justice, the Vietnamese experiment offers a valuable case study in the politics of penal reform — demonstrating both the possibilities and the limits of legislative change in a one-party state.

This article was produced with AI-assisted research and editorial support. Sources: The Diplomat, Viet Nam News, Reuters, Human Rights Watch.