24/11/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Tony Lloyd (United Kingdom, SOC), PACE Rapporteur on Prosecution of offences falling within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, undertook fact-finding missions to Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia on 20, 21, 22 and 23 November 2006 respectively. M. Lloyd welcomed constructive steps undertaken in all countries of the region to conclude outstanding issues relating to the prosecution of war criminals. However, he deeply regretted the lack of political will, so many years after the tragedy of the Balkan wars, to finalise this process and to close the impunity gap.
13/11/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Addressing the Colloquy “Protecting and supporting Human Rights Defenders”, organised by the Council of Europe today in Strasbourg, PACE rapporteur on the issue, Holger Haibach (Germany, EPP/CD) today called on the establishment of a proper protection mechanism for those persons. In some member States, human rights defenders have become the target of multifaceted repression, he said. And in spite of the international mechanisms, the Assembly has, so far, not been able to play its role in a satisfactory way.
03/10/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Dick Marty (Switzerland, ALDE), who is investigating alleged secret detentions and illegal transfers of detainees on behalf of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE), has announced that he intends to pay a visit to Guantanamo Bay in the company of UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Manfred Nowak. In a joint statement with Mr Marty, Assembly President René van der Linden said he expected the US – which holds observer status with the Council of Europe – to agree to the visit. Mr Marty hopes to have contact with inmates of US secret prisons who, according to President Bush, have recently been transferred to Guantanamo.
25/09/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Igor Sutyagin, Valentin Danilov and Mikhail Trepashkin, all convicted of espionage following high-profile cases in Russia, should be set free without further delay as there are strong indications that they did not receive fair trials, according to a PACE report made public today. The report, prepared by Christos Pourgourides (Cyprus, EPP/CD) on behalf of the Legal Affairs Committee, said judges and juries were changed repeatedly without adequate reason, the defence was unable to question experts about the secret nature of the information allegedly divulged, and the proceedings lacked openness.
12/07/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
"I am a little disappointed at the lack of progress in the investigation concerning the instigators and organisers of the Gongadze killing,” said Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger (Germany, ALDE), who is preparing a PACE report on the Gongadze case and other Kuchma-era crimes. At a press conference today in Kyiv she said: "It is good that three officers are on trial for having committed the crime. This is necessary, but not sufficient. The Council of Europe will observe carefully whether all steps are taken to make use of all the available evidence."
07/07/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
At the end of a three-day visit to Italy, the Rapporteur on the implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, Erik Jurgens (Netherlands, SOC), urged the authorities, as well as his parliamentary colleagues, to resolve outstanding problems as a matter of top priority, stressing the need for "swift measures to ensure that the Strasbourg Court and Committee of Ministers are not suffocated by Italian cases". At the same time he welcomed the recent "Azzolini Law", the draft text on re-opening of judicial proceedings, and other reform efforts. After visits to the United Kingdom, Turkey, Ukraine and Russia, this was the last in a series of five. Mr Jurgens' report focuses on 13 member states in which important delays or difficulties in implementing Court judgments have arisen.
20/06/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Erik Jurgens (Netherlands, SOC), rapporteur on the Implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, visited Ukraine on 19 and 20 May. The rapporteur welcomed the recent Law for the execution of the Court’s judgments by Ukraine and encouraged the authorities to resolve the outstanding problems as a matter of priority. The authorities gave the assurances that they recognize the problems that give rise to appeals, many of them repetitive, to the European Court of Human Rights, and are diligently trying to find solutions; by new legislations and by the training of judges.
07/06/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly rapporteur Dick Marty today revealed what he called a global “spider’s web” of CIA detentions and transfers and listed seven Council of Europe member states which could be held responsible, in varying degrees, for violations of the rights of named individuals by colluding in these operations. In a 67-page explanatory memorandum to his report, made public in Paris today at a meeting of the Assembly’s Legal Affairs Committee, he said: “It is now clear… that authorities in several European countries actively participated with the CIA in these unlawful activities. Other countries ignored them knowingly, or did not want to know.”
07/06/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
The United States has progressively woven a clandestine “spider’s web” of disappearances, secret detentions and unlawful inter-state transfers – spun with the collaboration or tolerance of Council of Europe member states, PACE's Legal Affairs Committee said today. In a draft resolution adopted at a meeting in Paris, based on a report by Dick Marty (Switzerland, ALDE), the committee said hundreds of persons had become entrapped in this web. The report will be debated by the plenary Assembly in Strasbourg on 27 June.
02/06/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
PACE rapporteur Dick Marty (Switzerland, ALDE) will present his report on alleged secret detentions and unlawful inter-state transfers involving Council of Europe member states to the Legal Affairs Committee in Paris on Wednesday 7 June. The report is scheduled for debate during the plenary session of the 630-member Assembly in Strasbourg on Tuesday 27 June 2006.
31/05/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
The PACE Rapporteur on the Implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), Erik Jurgens (Netherlands, SOC), qualified discussions he had during his high-level two-day-visit in Moscow as most constructive. After the United Kingdom and Turkey, this visit was the third in a series of five – with the next visits scheduled for June and July to Ukraine and Italy respectively. Mr Jürgen’s report will focus on 13 member states in which important delays or difficulties have arisen.
30/05/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Erik Jurgens (Netherlands, SOC), who is preparing a report on the implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights for the Legal Affairs Committee of the PACE, is due to visit Moscow from 30 to 31 May 2006. He will meet members of parliament, the Presidents of the Constitutional and Supreme Courts, the General Prosecutor and Chief Military Prosecutor as well as members of the presidential administration. A press conference will be held at the headquarters of Interfax (2 Pervaya Tverskaya-Yamskaya Ul.), at 4.30 pm on 31 May.