Rome will be at the forefront of the world's largest protest against the death penalty on Friday, just days ahead of a crucial United Nations vote on suspending state executions.
The event, spearheaded by the Rome-based Catholic group Sant'Egidio, will involve demonstrations in 700 cities around the world, with important monuments illuminated in protest against capital punishment.
In Rome, the Colosseum will be bathed in light, commemorating November 30, 1786, when Tuscany became the first state in the Western world to abolish the death penalty.
Rome's La Sapienza University has organized a series of live video connections to events around the world, including screenings of interviews with campaigners, while a free show is planned for the capital's auditorium.
Mario Marazziti, a spokesperson for Sant'Egidio and co-founder of the World Coalition against the Death Penalty, recalled Italy's long history as an opponent of the death penalty.
''Italy was one of the first countries to push for its abolition, backed by Europe,'' he said.
''The fight for a moratorium on executions is the sign of an international policy free of dirty interests''.
Named Cities For Life, the event comes in the middle of two key UN votes on the death penalty.
In mid-November, the UN's Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee voted in favour of resolution imposing ''a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death penalty''.
The General Assembly will vote on the same text on December 19 or 20.
The opinion of the committee - which approved the resolution by 99 votes to 52 with 33 abstentions - is not binding but few members are expected to change their positions during the Assembly vote.
The resolution passed despite a bid to derail it by inserting amendments on the right to life of unborn children.
''Italy played a leading role in proposing and bringing to fruition this initiative, acting very wisely,'' commented Italian President Giorgio Napolitano.
Marazziti hailed the vote as ''historic'' and recalled 15 years of ''hard work'' in which more than 50 countries abandoned capital punishment.
Drafted by the 27-member European Union, some have dismissed the initiative as a mainly European affair.
But Marazziti, while admitting that Europe had played a ''historic role'' in the move towards abolishing the death penalty in the past, pointed out this latest drive was supported by countries around the world.
The resolution passed despite opposition from the United States, China, the Organization of Islamic Countries, the League of Arab States and several Caribbean and Asian countries.
China, Iran, Iraq, the US, Pakistan and Chad account for some 90% of executions worldwide.
Marazziti visited the UN complex in New York last week, where he presented the president of the UN General Assembly, Srgjan Kerim, with a petition supporting the moratorium.
The list contained over five million signatures, collected in 152 countries around the world since 1998.
Marazziti also presented Kerim with four video statements by figures opposed to the death penalty: the head of the Church of England Rowan Williams, the Argentinean Nobel Peace Prize laureate Adolfo Perez Esquivel, the Muslim theologian Siti Musdah Muliva, and Cardinal Renato Raffaele Martino, President of the Pontifical Council of Justice and Peace.
In his comment, the cardinal said: ''You cannot punish one crime with another crime, and the death penalty is murder''.
According to the London-based human rights organization Amnesty International, 130 of 192 member states have already abolished the death penalty in law or practice.
Furthermore, only 25 countries carried out executions in 2006, while over 50 countries have abolished the death penalty for all crimes since 1990.
The UN General Assembly has adopted two past resolutions on capital punishment, both of which strongly pushed for by Italy. These resolutions, approved in 1971 and 1977, said it was ''desirable'' that the death penalty be abolished in all countries.
