According to a law passed by the local parliament on Monday, those sentenced to death in Idaho, a state in the west of the United States, can be shot if a lethal injection is not possible, according to AFP.

Approved by 24 votes “for” and 11 “against” the Senate of this conservative state, the text must be ratified by the governor.

Thus, Idaho will become the fifth US state to approve this method of execution, after Utah, Oklahoma, Mississippi and South Carolina, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Since 1976 and the end of a brief moratorium on the death penalty in the United States, two men and one woman have been executed this way – all in Utah (in the west) – the last execution was in 2010.

US states that use the death penalty face the greatest difficulty in procuring the substances needed for lethal injection, due to opposition from pharmaceutical companies that do not want to be associated with the death penalty.

Execution is possible in Idaho only if lethal injection is not possible.

The ACLU condemned the passage of the law as “appalling,” calling it “archaic.”

“The firing squad is particularly horrific (…) such executions leave lasting scars on all involved,” the ACLU of Idaho said in a statement.

The people killed by the firing squad “likely suffered extreme levels of pain and torture,” the organization added, citing experts.