A/HRC/30/18 dignity. Furthermore, the General Assembly has justified, in resolutions adopted during the past eight years and supported by an increasing majority of Member States, its calls for a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death penalty, by stating that the use of the death penalty undermines human dignity (see resolutions 62/149, 63/168, 65/206, 67/176 and 69/186). In its guidelines on the death penalty, the European Union considers that the death penalty constitutes a serious violation of human rights and human dignity. 3 The Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries stated that the death penalty is an intolerable and inhuman attack on human dignity and a violation of human rights.4 Fortytwo member States of the Council of Europe also pointed out that “the death penalty is an intolerable affront to human dignity, and goes hand in hand with numerous violations of the human rights of the condemned and their families”. 5 7. In their submissions relating to the present report, as well as policy statements issued at various forums, several States referred to human dignity as a key argument for the abolition of the death penalty. For instance, Albania stated that “this kind of punishment is not compatible with human rights principles and constitutes a direct insult to human dignity”; Canada viewed that “the death penalty is incompatible with respect for human dignity and the value of human life”; the Holy See explained that its abolitionist position is “framed within the proper ethical context of defending the inviolable dignity of the human person and the role of the legitimate authority to defend in a just manner the common good of society”; Namibia indicated that “the death penalty undermines human dignity, which is inherent to every human being”; Portugal noted that “it opposes the death penalty in all circumstances, as it represents an irreversible loss of the right to life and a gross violation of human rights, and it is an unjustified attack on human dignity”; and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland expressed the view that “the death penalty undermines human dignity”. 8. The constitutions of several countries stipulate that the death penalty undermines human dignity. For instance, the Constitution of Côte d’Ivoire recognizes the need to respect human dignity and prohibits “any punishment leading to the deprivation of human life”. The Constitution of Finland states that “no one shall be sentenced to death, tortured or otherwise treated in a manner violating human dignity”. The Interim Constitution of Nepal provides that “every person shall have the right to live in dignity, and no law shall provide for the death penalty”. 9. A significant number of national courts have also referred to human dignity in relation to the death penalty. In Gregg v. Georgia, Justice Brennan of the Supreme Court of the United States of America filed a dissenting opinion stating that “the fatal constitutional infirmity in the punishment of death is that it treats members of the human race as nonhumans, as objects to be toyed with and discarded. It is thus inconsistent with the fundamental premise of the Clause that even the vilest criminal remains a human being possessed of common human dignity”.6 The Canadian Supreme Court has recognized that capital punishment constitutes a serious invasion of human dignity, and several judges expressed the opinion that the death penalty “is the supreme indignity to the individual, the ultimate corporal punishment, the final and complete lobotomy and the absolute and 3 4 5 6 4 See www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/droi/dv/601_dpguidelines_/ 601_dpguidelines_en.pdf. Statement issued by the Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries on 5 March 2014 before the Human Rights Council (on file with the Secretariat and available for consultation). Statement issued by 42 member States of the Council of Europe on 5 March 2014 before the Human Rights Council (on file with the Secretariat and available for consultation). See https://law.resource.org/pub/us/case/reporter/US/428/428.US.153.74-6257.