30/05/2017 Standing Committee
PACE, meeting in Prague at Standing Committee level, today fully supported the draft protocol amending the Additional Protocol to the Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons. Following the proposals of the rapporteur Philippe Mahoux (Belgium, SOC), the unanimously adopted opinion underlines the sensitive nature of cases relating to the transfer of sentenced persons, which may raise a number of questions pertaining to human rights.
The Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons was adopted in 1983 to further the social rehabilitation of sentenced persons by facilitating their transfer to their countries of origin. The Additional Protocol to the convention, adopted in 1997, provides for exceptions to the rule according to which a transfer requires the consent of the sentenced person.
Due to some practical difficulties in the application of the convention, the Committee of Ministers has prepared a draft protocol amending the Additional Protocol. The proposed changes are aimed, in particular, at extending the scope of the application of the Additional Protocol to persons who moved freely to their country of origin and, in the case of transfer of sentenced persons subject to an expulsion measure, at deleting the consequential link between the expulsion measure and the sentence imposed.