By Aamir Latif
KARACHI, Pakistan
Pakistani authorities have executed 12 people on Tuesday, the highest number in a single day since the end of a ban on the death penalty.
The convicts, executed at different jails throughout the country, had been found guilty of murders and kidnapping for ransom.
The government completely lifted a moratorium on executions on March 10, having partially resumed the use of the death penalty, for terror cases, after a December Taliban attack that killed more than 140 people.
International and local human rights groups, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, have called for an immediate halt to executions.
Pakistan had imposed a de-facto ban on capital punishment in 2008 in exchange for trade benefits from the European Union.
