ITALIAN NGOs BACK MORATORIUM ON EXECUTIONS

at the informative session in Rome for non-governmental organisations in preparation for the World Conference against Racism, Italian NGOs supported Hands Off Cain’s proposal for a global moratorium on executions through a UN resolution.
Around 80 Italian NGOs and representatives from Africa, Asia-Pacific and the Americas attended the two-day conference, July 23-24, held at the Italian Ministry for Foreign Affairs.
The meeting produced an informative document which will now be discussed in the upcoming European preparatory meeting for the WCAR to be held in Geneva from July 31 to August 10.
The document dealt with sources, forms and contemporary causes of racism; victims of racism, racial discrimination and xenophobia; measures of prevention; and provisions of effective remedies, recourse, redress and other measures at national, regional and international levels.
These will be the main themes of the Third United Nations World Conference against Racism, Racial discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance (WCAR) to be held in Durban, South Africa, from August 31 to September 7, 2001. The conference will be preceded by an NGO Forum, also held in Durban, from August 28 to 31, 2001.
NGOs will be able to participate in the conference, and are being urged to provide effective solutions for inclusion in the action-plan that the WCAR will produce.
The document resulting from the Rome meeting identified a number of areas where action can be taken at international and national levels. It also recognises the death penalty as an instrument of subordination of minorities, and supports an international moratorium on executions.
“We state our opposition to the death penalty not only in its political and moral dimensions, but also as a clear instrument for the subordination of minorities and the socially diverse.
“We therefore support the approval of an international moratorium on executions as a first means of blocking abuses against minorities and political opponents. We also propose the promotion of a study to identify the effective function of the application of this instrument in crime deterrence,” the document reads.
The document was opposed by three NGOs.