28/09/2026 Session
PACE President Petra Bayr, opening the Assembly’s autumn session in Strasbourg, has called for preparatory work to begin this autumn on a binding Council of Europe convention to create a right to a safe, healthy and sustainable environment.
“There is no human right that survives an uninhabitable continent,” she pointed out. “I want us to move, together, towards a binding convention. Not a declaration. Not a recommendation. A treaty – with binding commitments behind it. A right without robust implementation mechanisms is only a wish.” The Assembly is due to hold a general debate on accelerating climate action with young people on Thursday.
The President also urged parliaments across Europe to rapidly ratify of the Council of Europe treaty on AI and human rights, the world’s first binding treaty on Artificial Intelligence: “The people who build these systems are asking for guardrails themselves. And when the engineers ask for brakes, parliaments have run out of excuses. A convention with signatures and only two ratifications protects nobody. It is a promise locked in a drawer. Machines calculate, but humans decide.”
Turning to Ukraine, the President pledged to assist the country with fighting corruption and organising elections when conditions allow: “Fighting corruption is not a favour we ask of Kyiv. It is armour we help them put on. It is the part of the war that continues after the shooting stops.”
On the future of the Council of Europe, the President welcomed efforts to ensure it remains relevant in the current volatile political context, and that it remains fit for purpose, while recalling that the Assembly is one of the two statutory organs of the Organisation: “A bird flies with two wings. Clip one, and it does not fly more efficiently. It falls. This is why we will develop a comprehensive consolidated position in the form of a report.” The Assembly will hold a general policy debate on the Council’s role later in the week.
Other topics covered included building a democratic Russia, Ceuta and the challenge of migration and the forthcoming European Conference of Presidents of Parliaments in Rome.