25 January 2007 :

so far, 18 Mayors of European capital cities have signed the Mayor of Rome’s appeal to get the International Community to establish a moratorium on the death penalty as soon as possible, with the ultimate goal being its complete abolition.
To gain signatures for Veltroni’s appeal, Leonardo Domenici, the Mayor of Florence and President of ANCI, appealled extensively to the other Italian cities.
“As the Mayors of Europe, while an execution occurs in too many parts of the world every day, we are launching an appeal to put a stop to the most insupportable violence against human dignity and one of our fundamental rights: the right to life” the document states.
“The death penalty isn’t only immoral and shameful. It not only adds horror upon horror, feeding the spiral of hate and dehumanisation of society. The death penalty is useless and does not reduce the crimes its intended to combat.”
We believe that justice doesn’t require the death penalty. Justice can be followed and reached without false deterrents, without reducing the state to the level of the individual who has murdered. Its valid for everyone, even for those who are stained with the horrendous guilt of grave crimes agaisnt humanity, for which punishment is just and necessary.
The death penalty must end. It’s a hope for everyone, one that doesn’t need to be surrendered, and we continue to believe that we can achieve things that don’t seem possible today. The Mayors said “after the important consensus reached at the European Parliament and at the Council of Ministers, we made the appeal to the European Union, asking for determined support for the proposal for a moratorium that suspends capital punishment in every corner of the world.
“We made an appeal to the International Community to establish, as soon as possibile a moratorium on the death penalty in view its complete abolition.”
The appeal has been signed by Walter Veltroni, Mayor of Rome, Leonardo Domenici (Florence), Job Cohen (Amsterdam), Nikitas Kaklamanis (Athens), Freddy Thielemans (Brussels), Gàbor Demsky (Budapest), Vincent Jackson (Dublin), Paul Borg Olivier (Valletta), Ken Livingstone (London), Zoran Jankovic (Ljubliana), Paul Helminger (Luxemburg), Alberto Ruiz Gallardón Jimenez (Madrid), Bertrand Delanoë (Paris), Aivars Aksenoks (Riga), Boyko Borissov (Sofia), Jüri Ratas (Tallinn), Michael Häulp (Vienna), Wim Deetman (The Hague).