Gambia has executed nine convicted criminals, the Civil Society Associations reported Saturday as Amnesty International warned that dozens more on death-row are under imminent threat as the West African nation carries out its first death sentences in 27 years. 
 
 President Yaya Jammeh vowed earlier this month to execute all inmates sentenced to death "to ensure that criminals get what they deserve, that is, those who killed are killed and those who deserve to be put away from the society are put away from the society in accordance with the law." 
 
 A government statement issued late Friday night said "All persons on death row have been tried by the Gambian courts of competent jurisdiction and thereof convicted and sentenced to death in accordance with the law. They have exhausted all their legal rights of appeal as provided by the law." 
 
 It added "the peace and stability of our beloved nation as regards to protection of the lives, liberty and property of individuals must at all cost be preserved and jealously guarded." 
 
 Eight men and one woman were removed from their prison cells Friday night and executed, London-based Amnesty reported, quoting "credible sources." It said two of those executed are believed to be foreigners from Senegal. 
 
 A barrage of protests met the move, with expressions of shock coming from the African Union, the Economic Community of West African States, the French and Nigerian governments and human rights groups. 
 
 It was not clear how the prisoners were executed, but Gambia's constitution says executions should be by hanging. "What is however clear is that inmates were rounded up at 9.30 p.m. Thursday August 23 and that by the morning of August 24, the bodies were actually lying in the Mile Two Prison yard," the Civil Society Associations of Gambia reported. 
 
 Amnesty warned "more persons are under threat of imminent executions today and in the coming days." 
 
 Amnesty said the executions are the first in Gambia since 1987. Gambia reinstated the death penalty in 1995 but had not executed anyone, former minister Omar Jallow has told The Associated Press. 
 
 Amnesty said there were 47 inmates on death row before Friday's executions: government figures put the number at 42 men and two women and another three men reportedly also received the death sentence this year. 
 
 Capital punishment can be imposed in Gambia for murder and treason. Three of those reportedly executed had been sentenced for treason, Amnesty said. It's not known how many of those on death row have been sentenced for alleged coup-plotting, a treasonable offense that could indicate Jammeh is using the executions to get rid of political opponents. 
 
 Jammeh was reelected in November in elections that were "neither free nor fair," according to the U.S. State Department. Its annual human rights report criticized "the government's harassment and abuse of its critics, which resulted in a muzzled press and the death, torture, arrest and detention, and sometimes enforced disappearance of citizens." 
 
 Amnesty called the executions, if confirmed, "a hugely retrograde step" putting Gambia among a minority of African states that still impose the death penalty. Thirty-eight of the 54 members of the African Union have abolished the death penalty or, if it is still in their law books, do not perform executions, Amnesty International said. 

 There are now conflicting accounts whether authorities in The Gambia have executed nine prisoners, as reported by Amnesty International.Amnesty said Friday that according to "reliable sources," nine death-row inmates were taken from their cells the night before and executed.A group called the Civil Society Associations of Gambia says on its website that it confirmed the executions, and that on Friday morning the bodies were seen lying in the yard of the Mile Two Central Prison.However, the president of a rights group in neighboring Senegal tells says that "so far, nobody was executed."Alioune Tine, president of the African Assembly for the Defense of Human Rights, says his information comes from Gambian opposition members and journalists and the foreign ministers of The Gambia and Benin.A Gambian government statement late Friday defended the country's death-penalty laws, but neither confirmed nor denied any executions had taken place.If confirmed, the executions would be first in the tiny West African nation in more than a quarter-century.President Yahya Jammeh said earlier this week that he will ensure that the death penalty is "carried out to the letter" by mid-September for all condemned prisoners.Government officials have confirmed the president's statement, but have not discussed any individual cases. Before Thursday, it was believed that Gambian courts had handed down death sentences for 47 imprisoned men and women - many of whom had been charged with treason.Amnesty International is appealing to Jammeh to reverse the "giant leap backwards" he took by ordering the execution of all prisoners already sentenced to death.News reports say the African Union and Britain also urged Jammeh to call off the executions. Without responding directly, authorities in Banjul have stressed that all condemned prisoners have already exhausted their judicial rights of appeal.One account said two of those executed were Senegalese.The Gambia is a small sliver of land surrounded by Senegal, except where the Gambia River empties into the Atlantic Ocean near Banjul, the capital.President Jammeh has ruled the country since seizing power in military coup in 1994. His administration has been accused of many human-rights abuses.The Gambia outlawed capital punishment decades ago, but Jammeh reinstated the death penalty in 1995. However, there had been no reports of executions until now. 
 
 Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.
– Gambian leader Yahya Jammeh alarmed human rights activists last week when he vowed to quickly execute all of the nation's prisoners on death row. Amnesty International is now worried that he's started making good on the threat, reports Voice of America. Nine inmates were killed late Thursday, the first executions in the West African country in 27 years, and the rights group says more could come in the next few days. It's not clear how many inmates are on death row, but most wire accounts put the number at least 47 at the time of Jammeh's announcement. Amnesty called on him to "reverse the giant leap backward" and call off any more hangings. Treason is a capital offense in Gambia, and critics fear that Jammeh will use it an excuse to get rid of political opponents, reports AP.