EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT. CHINA AND UNITED STATES URGED TO ABOLISH DEATH PENALTY

March 30, 2005: the Foreign Affairs Committee of the European Parliament voted in favour of the 2004 Annual Report on Human Rights. Simon Coveney MEP EPP-ED presented the report to the Committee as Rapporteur. The report was passed by 63 votes to three and focuses strongly on the EU's responsibility to use its influence to pressurise countries to abolish the death penalty, particularly in China; the US; Saudi Arabia and others. Coveney's report on Human Rights in the world in 2004 and the European Union's policy on the matter looked at issues in 70 different countries highlighting human rights abuses, and progress where visible. It took eight thematic approaches: Abolishing the Death Penalty; Children's Rights; the Impact of Conflict on Women and Children; the War on Terrorism and Human Rights; Trafficking in humans and human organs - sex industry and child labour; the role of international business in human rights; impunity and the role of the International Criminal Court and Institutional and Policy Developments.
Coveney was due to present the report to the plenary session of the European Parliament, sitting in Brussels, on 27 April. (Sources: Aki, 31/03/2005)