1. The Committee of Ministers welcomes Parliamentary
Assembly Recommendation 2018 (2013) on “Promoting alternatives to
imprisonment” which is has transmitted to the European Committee
on Crime Problems (CDPC) and the European Committee for the Prevention
of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT)
for information and comments.
2. The Committee of Ministers shares the Parliamentary Assembly
opinion that alternatives to imprisonment need to be promoted and
that their effective use can contribute to reducing rates of imprisonment and
thus to combatting prison overcrowding.
3. Like the Assembly, it notes that substantive standard-setting
texts in this regard have been developed by the Council of Europe
in the course of the yearsNote which
provide valuable guidelines to the national authorities of its member
States.
4. The Committee of Ministers has instructed the European Committee
on Crime Problems (CDPC) to elaborate a draft Recommendation on
electronic monitoring, with the aim of providing national authorities
with ethical and professional guidelines for the use of this new
surveillance technology in the framework of the criminal justice
process in conformity with existing human rights safeguards in Europe.
It is expected that the draft recommendation will be submitted to
the Committee of Ministers at the beginning of 2014. The Parliamentary
Assembly will be kept informed about any further developments regarding
this text.
