Capital punishment in Europe rights became a particular priority. The Kingdom of Italy had abolished the death penalty for civilians with the adoption of the Zanardelli Penal Code of 1889, but the Fascists had reintroduced it with the 1930 Penal Code. The European Convention on Human Rights was adopted in 1950, but some countries took many years to ratify it. The United Kingdom retained the death penalty for high treason until 1998; however, this technicality was superseded by the absolute ban on the death penalty in 1976. William Joyce was the last person to be put to death for high treason in the UK,
Death penalty for homosexuality the death penalty for homosexuality, however Amnesty International could find no instances of the death penalty. Australian states and territories inherited British laws relating to homosexuality, and laws passed in nineteenth century colonial parliaments retained the provisions which made homosexual activity a capital crime. Over time, various jurisdictions began to reduce the death penalty for sodomy to life imprisonment, with Victoria being the last to remove the death penalty for this crime, in 1949. The last person arrested for homosexual sex in Australia was a man in 1984 in Tasmania.[citation needed] The last part of Australia to legalise consensual homosexual