The European Parliament approved with an overwhelming majority a resolution for a moratorium on the execution of death penalties.
The document calls on all EU member states to ratify the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), aiming at the complete abolition of the death penalty.
The resolution voices concerns over the fact that the death penalty still exists in national laws and provides for the death of thousands of people each year.
The EP's goal is to push for an UN resolution banning the death penalty worldwide.
The European parliamentarians have repeatedly expressed their firm opposition to capital punishment, which is banned throughout the EU.
In the middle of January, the MEPs called on European Union member states to consider revising its engagement policy with Libya unless the death-sentenced Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor are released.
A Libyan court condemned to death December 19 five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor for knowingly infecting hundreds of Libyan children with HIV.