(ROME) - The outgoing Italian parliament should ratify the European Union's new reform treaty even as the country heads into elections in April, President Giorgio Napolitano said Monday.

"Italy should ratify the treaty, even during elections," Napolitano said during a speech at the University of Trento in northeastern Italy.

"No member state should shirk its responsibilities or the commitments it has made," he said, adding: "Time is running out."

Napolitano dissolved parliament last week and elections were set for April 13-14 after the collapse of prime minister Romano Prodi's centre-left government.

But technically, the outgoing parliament can still vote on important or pending measures, according to Pier Vincenzo Porcacchia, the head of the parliamentary press service.

"The government has already submitted the draft law containing the ratification of the treaty to the Senate," Porcacchia told AFP.

Last week, France became the fifth EU country -- and the first major EU power -- to ratify the new treaty, which must be approved by all 27 member states before it can come into force as planned on January 1, 2009.

The other states to have ratified it so far are Hungary, Slovenia, Malta and Romania.

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