Reinforcing the effectiveness of Council of Europe treaty law
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- Text adopted by the Standing Committee, acting
on behalf of the Assembly on 21 May 2010 (see Doc. 12175, report of the Committee
on Legal Affairs and Human Rights, rapporteur: Mr Prescott). See
also Recommendation 1920
(2010).
- Thesaurus
1. The Parliamentary Assembly underlines
the key role of the Council of Europe in drawing up human rights standards
and its major contribution to the development of international law
through its treaties. The Assembly is committed to ensuring that
these standards are fully applied.
2. The Council of Europe’s treaties embody the Organisation’s
shared values and constitute a fundamental body of law.
3. As the political driving force of the Council of Europe, the
Assembly has initiated many of these conventions and welcomes the
successful development of this European legal acquis.
4. The Assembly emphasises that many Council of Europe treaties
deal with pressing issues and include ground-breaking provisions
to supplement existing international law.
5. The Assembly welcomes the fact that the Council of Europe
has laid the foundations of an innovative and coherent body of European
law, particularly in its special fields of expertise of human rights
protection, democracy and the rule of law. This body of conventions,
covering the entire continent, forms the basis for a Europe without
dividing lines.
6. One distinctive feature of Council of Europe treaty law is
the independent machinery established by certain conventions to
monitor their implementation, the most advanced being the European
Court of Human Rights. Thanks in particular to these monitoring
arrangements, the Council of Europe’s treaty law has proved its
added value and shown itself to be effective.
7. However, the Assembly regrets that the authority of Council
of Europe treaty law is adversely affected by the excessively low
member state participation in certain conventions. It calls on all
the member states to ratify the Organisation’s “core treaties” as
a matter of priority, particularly those provided with monitoring mechanisms.
8. It also notes that certain treaties are outdated or even obsolete
and that a minority of them have never come into force even more
than 20 years after their adoption.
9. If Council of Europe treaty law is to retain its relevance
and value, its conventions must reflect the realities of present-day
society.
10. The Assembly believes that two steps must be taken to make
Council of Europe treaties more effective and ensure that they are
implemented. Firstly, there must be increased member state participation
in those treaties, in other words a larger number of ratifications.
Secondly, the relevance of Council of Europe treaties must be ensured
by updating them, by establishing procedures for abrogating those
that are clearly obsolete and withdrawing those that have not come
into force within a certain number of years of their adoption.
11. The Assembly calls on member states to:
11.1 ratify, as a matter of priority, what the Assembly considers
to be the core Council of Europe treaties (see appendix) with as
few reservations as possible;
11.2 withdraw their reservations, derogations and restrictive
declarations concerning Council of Europe treaties, particularly
the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms,
also known as the European Convention on Human Rights (ETS No. 5).
12. The Assembly invites each national parliament to:
12.1 require its government to submit
during each legislature a report on its policy on ratifying Council of
Europe conventions, as is already the case in certain member states;
12.2 instruct its foreign or European affairs committee and,
where appropriate, those on legal affairs and human rights, to hold
debates on Council of Europe activities in the legal and human rights
fields, with particular emphasis on the application of the corresponding
legal instruments;
12.3 report to it regularly on the progress of national procedures
for ratifying Council of Europe treaties and explain to it, where
necessary and in a spirit of dialogue, any difficulties encountered.
Appendix – Core Council of Europe treaties
Human rights (including minority rights)
- Convention for the Protection
of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ETS No. 5)
- Protocol No. 1 (ETS No. 9 − protection of property)
- Protocol No. 4 (ETS No. 46 − freedom of movement, prohibition
of expulsion of nationals and prohibition of collective expulsion
of aliens)
- Protocol No. 6 (ETS No. 114 − abolition of the death penalty)
- Protocol No. 7 (ETS No. 117 − various: immigration legislation,
criminal law and equality)
- Protocol No. 12 (ETS No. 177 − general prohibition of
all forms of discrimination)
- Protocol No. 13 (ETS No. 187 − abolition of the death
penalty in all circumstances)
- Protocol No. 14 (CETS No. 194 − reform of the Court)
- European Social Charter/European Social Charter (revised)
(ETS No. 35 and ETS No. 163)
- Additional Protocol to the European Social Charter (ETS
No. 128 – additional rights)
- Protocol amending the European Social Charter (ETS No. 142
– reform of the supervisory machinery) (not yet in force)
- Additional Protocol to the European Social Charter (ETS
No. 158 – providing for a system of collective complaints)
- European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and
Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (ETS No. 126) and its
amending protocols
- Convention for the Protection of Individuals with regard
to Automatic Processing of Personal Data (ETS No. 108)
- European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ETS
No. 148)
- Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities
(ETS No. 157)
- Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking
in Human Beings (CETS No. 197)
- Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children
against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse (CETS No. 201)
Legal co-operation in criminal matters/combating
terrorism
- European Convention
on Extradition (ETS No. 24)
- Additional Protocol (ETS No. 86 – prohibition of extradition
for political offences and further reference to the ne bis in idem principle)
- Second Additional Protocol (ETS No. 98 – further provisions)
- European Convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters
(ETS No. 30)
- Additional Protocol (ETS No. 99 – redefines the provisions
of the convention)
- Second Additional Protocol (ETS No. 182 – cross-border
crime and data protection)
- European Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism (ETS
No. 90)
- Amending Protocol (ETS No. 190 – limiting the exceptions
to the treaty’s provisions)
- Criminal Law Convention on Corruption (ETS No. 173)
- Additional Protocol (ETS No. 191 – extending its scope
to persons exercising quasi-judicial functions)
- Civil Law Convention on Corruption (ETS No. 174)
- Convention on Cybercrime (ETS No. 185)
- Additional Protocol (ETS No. 189 – criminalisation of
racist acts)
- Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism
(CETS No. 196)
- Council of Europe Convention on Laundering, Search, Seizure
and Confiscation of the Proceeds from Crime and on the Financing
of Terrorism (CETS No. 198)
