27/09/2012 | President
“The recent allegation that a handball match involving Montpellier may have been fixed has highlighted a dramatic and growing problem in Europe,” said PACE President Jean-Claude Mignon. “I urge the authorities to get to the bottom of this affair as swiftly as possible, but – whatever the outcome of the judicial investigation – there is no doubt that wider action is urgently needed to tackle this looming threat...
21/09/2012 | President
When the Arab revolutions shook the entire world, at the end of 2010 / beginning of 2011, the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly had some concrete tools to offer and at least the prospect of a possible future cooperation with the parliaments of emerging democracies in its immediate neighbourhood...
20/09/2012 | President
“I was shocked and horrified to see media images of prison guards violently assaulting inmates in a prison in Georgia. These intolerable atrocities took place in a Council of Europe member state. President Saakashvili has announced his intention to punish the culprits. I hope that all those at all levels who bear any responsibility in this appalling affair will be identified and punished according to the law,” declared this morning PACE President Jean-Claude Mignon.
20/09/2012 | President
The main focus of the Assembly’s contribution to recent discussions on the future of the Court has been the national dimension, and more particularly, the parliamentary dimension ie the role that national parliaments can play in securing full and effective implementation of the rights guaranteed by the Convention at the domestic level...
20/09/2012 | President
Since several years, the Assembly has rung the alarm bell to warn Parliaments, governments and society at large of a series of signs and trends indicating that democracy is in crisis. The trust of citizens in democratic institutions, which is the basis of their legitimacy, has been fading. Electoral turnouts are very low in many countries.
17/09/2012 | President
"The crisis in Europe and worldwide is not just financial and economic, but also a crisis of democracy". While any crisis entails upheaval and suffering, however, it also brings "an opportunity to call things into question, to decide on the necessary priorities and to search actively for solutions" according to Jean-Claude Mignon, President of the PACE, when he made the opening speech today at the European Conference of Presidents of Parliaments.
17/09/2012 | President
"While most participants agreed that representative democracy is not in crisis in itself, we all agree that it is one of the main victims of the economic and financial crisis. But the current situation should rather be seen as an opportunity to bring the institutions of representative democracy closer to our citizens", PACE President Jean-Claude Mignon said today presenting the conclusions of the European Conference of Presidents of Parliament.
16/09/2012 | President
"We follow with great concern the violent protests that have flared up across the Middle East, triggered by the circulation of an Islamophobic film, and we wish to support and spread Pope Benedict XVI’s call for renewed Muslim-Christian co-operation in the Middle East; we underline that all religions can live together without hatred, respecting the beliefs of each, to build together a free and humane society," said Jean-Claude Mignon, PACE President, and his predecessor Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, former PACE President and member of the Turkish delegation to PACE.
12/09/2012 | President
“I am shocked and saddened to learn of the violent deaths of the US Ambassador in Libya and three of his colleagues,” said PACE President Jean-Claude Mignon. “Whatever the reasons, this is an unjustifiable attack on diplomats who were trying to help Libyans to build better lives. I would like to extend my wholehearted sympathies to the families of the victims, as well as the American authorities and people,” he said.
11/09/2012 | President
“I warmly welcome today’s European Parliament resolution on the illegal detention of prisoners in European countries by the CIA,” said Jean-Claude Mignon, PACE President. “It is now more than five years since Senator Dick Marty first presented to PACE credible evidence of secret CIA prisons in Poland and Romania, and the involvement of other European countries in illegal renditions...
05/09/2012 | President
"I join the international condemnation of the ‘glorification’ of the terrible crime which Mr Safarov has committed, and for which he has been condemned by a court in a Council of Europe member state," PACE President Jean-Claude Mignon said today. "His liberation is unacceptable, and I am extremely disappointed by the abusive use of a Council of Europe legal instrument in this affair."
29/08/2012 | President
PACE President Jean-Claude Mignon, and the co-rapporteurs for Ukraine, Mailis Reps (Estonia, ALDE) and Marietta de Pourbaix-Lundin (Sweden, EPP/CD), expressed their deep disappointment with the Court of Cassation rejection of the appeal by Yulia Tymoshenko against her conviction to seven years in prison in the so-called gas case. “The Assembly has stated on several occasions that her conviction in the gas case amounts to the criminalisation of normal political decision-making...” they said.