The Death Penalty in the OSCE Area–Background Paper 2017 accordance with the EU Guidelines on the Death Penalty, including statements, declarations or demarches on the death penalty aimed at, inter alia, addressing individual cases of concern in partner countries and advocating for the minimum standards defined by international law. Nationals facing the death penalty abroad According to the information received, 11 abolitionist participating States reported having nationals facing the death penalty abroad. A number of these states, namely France, Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden, were not able to share further information concerning their citizens on death row abroad for reasons of confidentiality.126 Other participating States shared information about their citizens on death row abroad. Greece reported a case of a Greek national, Konstantinos Fotopoulos, who has been sentenced to death in the United States of America. Greek authorities submitted a request for prisoner transfer that has been rejected by the United States authorities. Hungary reported that there has been only one Hungarian citizen (with double citizenship, Hungarian and United States), on death row abroad. William Charles Morva was sentenced to death in 2008 in the United States, in Virginia. The Hungarian Government stressed that, since then, it has reached out to the Governor of Virginia requesting to commute Morva’s death sentence, stating that Hungary strongly opposes the use of capital punishment under any circumstances.127 The case has been particularly controversial because there was evidence showing that Morva was suffering from severe mental illness. Virginia recently introduced draft legislation proposing the first formal definition of “severe mental illness” for the Code of Virginia.128 A few states, including Latvia and Norway, reported that they have provided their nationals on death row abroad with requested consular assistance, and 126  According to the Netherlands’ Personal Data Protection Act [Wet bescherming persoongegevens, or WBP] the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is bound, in this area, by the provisions of that Act, which is the Dutch transposition of EU Privacy Directive (95/46/EC). 127  In March 2017, after receiving a request for precautionary measures from the “Virginia Capital Representation Resource Center” (hereinafter “the applicants”), the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights examined the case of the dual national William Morva. The Court stated that “After analyzing the legal arguments and facts presented by the applicants, the Commission considers that in the event Morva is executed before it has had an opportunity to examine the merits of this matter, any eventual decision would be rendered moot in respect of the effectiveness of potential remedies resulting in irreparable harm. Consequently, pursuant to Article 25.1 of its Rules of Procedure, the Commission hereby requests that the United States take the necessary measures to preserve the life and physical integrity of William Charles Morva until the IACHR has ruled on his petition, so as not to render ineffective the processing of his case before the Inter-American system”. However, regardless of the ruling and Hungarian efforts, the death sentence of the concerned person was enforced on 6 July 2017. <https:// www.oas.org/es/cidh/decisiones/pdf/2017/9-17MC156-17-US.pdf>. 128  “Bill proposes formal definition of ‘severe mental illness’ for the Code of Virginia”, Daily Press, 30 December 2016, <http://www.dailypress.com/news/politics/dp-nws-shad-plank-1231-20161230-story.html>; see also <https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?171+sum+HB1522>. 37