GENEVA (Reuters) - United Nations experts on Wednesday called on U.S. authorities not to go ahead with the planned execution of an inmate by nitrogen hypoxia, saying the method may subject him to "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or even torture".
Kenneth Smith, convicted for a murder-for-hire committed in 1988, is scheduled to be executed in the U.S. state of Alabama on Jan. 25 using the method, which is intended to deprive him of oxygen by using a face mask connected to a cylinder of nitrogen.
