DAKAR, Senegal — Burkina Faso’s Council of Ministers has adopted a bill to restore the death penalty, targeting offenses such as treason, terrorism and espionage, authorities said.

“The adoption of this bill is part of reforms ... to have a justice that responds to the deep aspirations of our people,” Minister of Justice Edasso Rodrigue Bayala said in a Facebook post late Thursday.

The death penalty was abolished in the country in 2018.

The bill has to be adopted by parliament and reviewed by the courts before becoming law.

Marceau Sivieude, Amnesty International’s Regional Director for West and Central Africa, called the move a “serious setback for human rights in Burkina Faso,” and alarming “in the context of the ongoing crackdown on political opponents, human rights activists and jo

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