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 The United Kingdom retained the death penalty for high treason until 1998; however, this technicality was superseded by the absolute ban on the death penalty in 1976.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,
United Nations moratorium on the death penalty being its resolution 2005/59 of 20 April 2005, in which the Commission called upon states that still maintain the death penalty to abolish it completely and, in the meantime, to establish a moratorium on executions, "Recalling further" the important results accomplished by the former Commission of Human Rights on the question of the death penalty, and envisaging that the Human Rights Council could continue to work on this issue, "Considering" that the use of the death penalty undermines human dignity, and convinced that a moratorium on the use of the death penalty contributes to the enhancement and progressive development of