Caption: AdoptedRejectedWithdrawnNo electronic votes
02 October 2012
Tabled by Mr Patrick MORIAU, Mr Pasquale NESSA, Mr Younal LOUTFI, Mr Agustín CONDE, Mr Øyvind VAKSDAL, Mr George LOUCAIDES
Votes: 152 in favor 21 against 8 abstentions
In the draft resolution, replace paragraph 2 with the following paragraph:
"The Parliamentary Assembly notes that the criteria put forward by the above-mentioned experts were based on the specific circumstances of the civil war in Namibia in 1989. Whereas they were applied to individual cases with regard to two countries during their accession to the Council of Europe, they have never been subject to comprehensive debate or approval by the Parliamentary Assembly."
Explanatory note
Paragraph 2 of the draft resolution is factually inaccurate. The general criteria and the related document referred to were never approved by the Parliamentary Assembly. Neither a debate nor a vote on this document has been held since 2001.
03 October 2012
Tabled by Mr Christoph STRÄSSER, Mr Jerzy MONTAG, Mr Michael MCNAMARA, Ms Tineke STRIK, Mr René ROUQUET, Mr Boriss CILEVIČS, Mr Kimmo SASI
Votes: 108 in favor 53 against 16 abstentions
In the proposed amendment, in the first sentence, replace the words "were based on" with the following words: "were inspired by, inter alia,"
Explanatory note
The text as it stands is factually wrong. In actual fact, only one of the Secretary General's Independent Experts who participated in formulating the criteria developed for the Council of Europe had previously worked with an expert who had acted as the UN Security Council's expert on the situation of political prisoners in Namibia.
03 October 2012
Tabled by Mr Christoph STRÄSSER, Mr Jerzy MONTAG, Mr Michael MCNAMARA, Ms Tineke STRIK, Mr René ROUQUET, Mr Boriss CILEVIČS, Mr Kimmo SASI
In the proposed amendment, replace the second sentence with the following sentence: "They were applied to cases with regard to two countries during their accession to the Council of Europe and have not until now been subject to comprehensive debate or explicit approval by the Parliamentary Assembly."
Explanatory note
The sub-amendment aims to correct a factual inaccuracy whilst maintaining as much as possible of the text. The criteria were applied to well over 800 cases during the accession of two countries to the Council of Europe, and were subject to implicit approval by the Parliamentary Assembly when it approved the two previous reports on political prisoners.
02 October 2012
Tabled by Mr Patrick MORIAU, Mr Pasquale NESSA, Mr Younal LOUTFI, Mr Agustín CONDE, Mr Øyvind VAKSDAL, Mr George LOUCAIDES
In the draft resolution, replace paragraph 3 with the following paragraph:
"The Parliamentary Assembly confirms that the interpretation and application of any criteria defining a political prisoner are the exclusive competence of the European Court of Human Rights, which is the only authority to assess violations of fundamental rights and freedoms, as stipulated in the European Convention on Human Rights and its Protocols."
Explanatory note
A civil war in Southern Africa some 25 years ago should not form the basis of objective standards for all Council of Europe member States in the present day. Only the current case-law of the European Court of Human Rights should be considered as the 'gold standard' in this regard.