Raad van Europa: "Juridische fouten worden door doodstraf onherstelbare tragedies" (en)

Strasbourg, 10.10.2005 - "Killing people is wrong", said Terry Davis, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, in a public appeal on the occasion of the World Day Against the Death Penalty.

"That means that the death penalty is also wrong", continued Mr Davis. "The death penalty is wrong, because it is cruel and inhuman and because it transforms judicial errors into irreparable tragedies. The death penalty is also wrong because it devalues the respect for human life and does nothing to diminish the level of violence and crime in our societies. It should have no place in any civilised society.

There has not been a single execution in the forty-six member states of the Council of Europe since 1997. The priority today is to move from de facto abolition to a genuinely death-penalty-free zone. I am encouraged by the start of public campaign led by members of the Russian Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, for the Russian Federation to fulfil its accession commitment to formally abolish the death penalty.

"Finally, I want to appeal to Japan and the United States of America, as the only Observer States of the Organisation which still execute people, to reconsider their position. What is at stake is the most fundamental right to life and human dignity, and this is well worth a temporary drop of a few points in opinion polls. If the United States of America and Japan, as two leading democracies in the world, would abolish the death penalty, others would follow", concluded Terry Davis.

For more information, see our special file at http://www.coe.int/Files/DeathPenalty

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