04/11/2020 | President
PACE President Rik Daems has hailed the 70th anniversary of the European Convention on Human Rights with an appeal to Council of Europe member States to “cherish, uphold and treasure” the Convention, and said the Assembly would continue to draw attention to what he called “a new generation of...
04/11/2020 | President
Addressing the Annual Session of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe in Athens today, PACE President Rik Daems commended the Greek presidency for its leadership during tough times and particularly welcomed the ongoing trialogue between the Assembly, the Secretary General and the...
03/11/2020 | President
PACE President Rik Daems strongly condemned yesterday’s terrorist attack in Vienna and on behalf of the Assembly expressed his deepest condolences to the families of the victims, the authorities and the people of Austria. “Yesterday’s attack in Austria, as the recent ones in France, are attacks...
13/10/2020 | President
The Greek Alternate Minister of Foreign Affairs and Chair of the Council of Europe's Committee of Ministers, Miltiadis Varvitsiotis, the President of the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly, Rik Daems, and the Secretary General of the 47-nation Council of Europe, Marija Pejčinović Burić...
09/10/2020 | President
On the occasion of the World Day against the Death Penalty (10 October), PACE President Rik Daems made the following statement: “To date more than two-thirds of countries worldwide, 142 countries, have abolished the death penalty in law or no longer apply it, whereas 56 countries continue to use...
06/10/2020 | President
PACE President Rik Daems has again called for the drawing up of a protocol to the European Convention of Human Rights guaranteeing a right to a healthy environment, pointing out this would help push governments and parliaments to “go green”. Speaking at the “Human Rights for the Planet” virtual...
22/09/2020 | President
During a private audience on 21 September with Pope Francis, PACE President Rik Daems shared with His Holiness his conviction that a healthy environment should be considered a human right, and his hope that this could eventually be enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights in the form...
18/09/2020 | President
PACE President Rik Daems will have an audience with Pope Francis on 21 September. In addition, in the framework of a working visit, the PACE President will hold the next day bilateral meetings with the Speakers of both chambers of the Italian Parliament, Maria Elisabetta Casellati, President of...
15/09/2020 | President
The PACE President announced today that the October 2020 part-session of the Assembly will be replaced by a meeting of the Standing Committee – which acts in the name of the Assembly - on 12-13 October, to be continued on 22-23 October. “This meeting will be ‘enlarged’ to allow all PACE members...
14/09/2020 | President
“Strong and healthy democratic societies rely and thrive on equality, freedom, good governance, dignity, inclusiveness,” said Rik Daems, President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), speaking on the eve of the International Day of Democracy (15 September). “We are...
08/09/2020 | President
Speaking during an exchange of views on Belarus, organised by the Assembly’s Political Affairs Committee, PACE President Rik Daems stressed that “a solution will only come from the Belarusian people”. In a pressing plea for non-violence, he called for an immediate end to unlawful detentions...
27/08/2020 | President
In a joint statement by the Alternate Foreign Minister of Greece, Miltiadis Varvitsiotis, President of the Committee of Ministers, Rik Daems, President of the Parliamentary Assembly and Marija Pejčinović Burić, Secretary General, the three Council of Europe leaders called on the Belarussian...