Burnham says public execution is ‘abhorrent’ as US moves ahead with firing squad livestream

Prime Minister Andy Burnham has condemned public execution as “abhorrent” and said he would “never support” it.

Burnham’s words come as America’s plan to livestream the killing of a former army major by firing squad were questioned.

Asked about the possibility that Fort Hood gunman Nidal Malik Hasan’s execution is made public, and whether the UK should take a stand, Andy Burnham told The Rest Is Politics podcast: “I certainly would never support that.

“So, I’m happy to make my view clear.”

Hasan is due to be executed on December 3 after he was convicted of killing 13 people and injuring 32 others in a shooting at the Fort Hood military base in Texas in 2009.

US defence secretary Pete Hegseth said it will be public, telling TV outlet Real America’s Voice: “We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it.”

Vice president JD Vance has cast doubt on whether the Pentagon will livestream the execution and if it did, he said: “I’m not going to be watching it.”

Mr Burnham told the podcast, which will be released on Monday: “It’s something that I can’t say I ever want to see anywhere in the world, Alastair (Campbell, podcast host).

“It’s something that I find quite abhorrent in many ways. But, you know, I only want to speak for what we will do and why we will do it.”

Cabinet minister Bridget Phillipson previously said she found the plans “disturbing” and that she was “proud that our country did away with the death penalty a very, very long time ago”.

The equalities minister told the BBC: “The view of the Government is always that we’re repulsed to the death penalty, my personal view is that I’m opposed to the death penalty.

“And I find that rather disturbing is my honest reaction.”

She added: “It’s a matter for the US government.

“They are a close ally, does that mean that we support everything the US government does? No, but that’s not for us to involve ourselves in what are ultimately questions of US domestic policy.”