Official communication

On 1st November 2013 the collection of signatures for the European initiative STOP VIVISECTION ended. The total exceeded the minimum target of one million signatures across Europe. The final figures are not yet available because many of the signatures collected on paper from the 28 EU countries have yet to reach the Central Committee. In any case it is already certain that at least 12 countries have reached the national targets set by the European Regulation, demonstrating the high level of support at European level for STOP VIVISECTION.

This is the biggest democratic action ever undertaken against animal testing and one of the first successful cases of a European citizens' initiative, the new instrument provided by the EU Treaties to make possible direct citizen participation in the legislative process of the European Union.

Sincere thanks go to all those who with their commitment have made possible the achievement of this historic result which represents a milestone in the fight against the cruel and scientifically flawed practice of animal experiments, as well as a fundamental step towards its complete abolition in favor of scientific testing methods that are relevant to human health.

During the coming weeks the signatures collected will be counted and checked. After that the institutional process will begin, whereby the signatures will be checked by the national authorities and the validation of the final result achieved. This phase should be completed by March 2014. At that point, the European Commission will officially recognize the STOP VIVISECTION initiative and will subsequently FIX a date for a public hearing of STOP VIVISECTION representatives, André Menache and Gianni Tamino, by the European Commission. Following this hearing, the European Commission will have 3 months to prepare a written and public reply in which it will set out the legislative action it will propose in order to comply with the wishes of more than one million European citizens.

Source: www.stopvivisection.eu