05/10/2011 | Session
The Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights of PACE has today expressed its dismay that Ales Bialiatski, a highly-respected human rights defender and Nobel Peace Prize nominee, has been arrested by the Belarusian authorities.
05/10/2011 | Session
“Crimes committed by travelling sex offenders are among the worst forms of violence against children, because they reduce them to mere objects of abusive desires and commercial interests,” said Liliane Maury Pasquier (Switzerland,, SOC), Chair of the Social, Health and Family Affairs Committee, speaking today at the 4th meeting of the network of contact parliamentarians to stop sexual violence against children.
05/10/2011 | Session
“The outcome of the latest general amnesty in Armenia, the renewed impetus to investigate the 10 deaths during the March 2008 events, and the resulting start of a constructive dialogue between the opposition and ruling coalition mean that the chapter on the March 2008 events can finally be considered closed for the Assembly, whilst its monitoring of Armenia’s human rights and democracy obligations, including with respect of the investigation into the ten causalities, will continue unabated”, PACE said today.
05/10/2011 | Session
PACE has declared that images of child abuse on the internet should be rapidly removed where possible, but if this is not possible then they should – as a complementary measure, and following transparent procedures that respect human rights principles – be blocked. Unanimously approving a report by Agustín Conde Bajén (Spain, EPP/CD), the Assembly said Council of Europe member states should, in the long term, criminalise the intentional viewing of child abuse images.
04/10/2011 | Session
PACE today voted to grant “Partner for democracy” status to the Palestinian National Council – only the second time such status has been accorded. Presenting the report at today’s debate, Tiny Kox (Netherlands, UEL) said the status “created new opportunities for the Palestinian people” and could be seen as part of the Arab Spring.
04/10/2011 | Session
The Parliament of Kyrgyzstan has formally submitted its request for “Partner for democracy” status with the Assembly, PACE President Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu announced today during PACE’s autumn session. The Moroccan Parliament and the Palestinian National Council already hold this status, which allows parliaments from neighbouring regions to take part in the Assembly’s work in return for commitments to uphold the values of the Council of Europe.
04/10/2011 | Session
At the end of a debate on co-operation between the Council of Europe and the emerging democracies in the Arab world, PACE invited members of the UN Security Council – in particular France, Russia, the United Kingdom, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Germany and Portugal, member states of the Council of Europe – to support the Palestinian formal request to join the United Nations as a full member state.
04/10/2011 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
In a resolution adopted today, PACE calls on member states not to recognise or support in any way the de facto authorities of territories resulting from unlawful secessions, in particular those supported by foreign military interventions.
04/10/2011 | Migration, International Protection and Economic Co-operation
" A child is first and foremost a child, and only in second place a migrant. This is the starting point for any discussion about undocumented migrant children; the status of the child is secondary and arguably irrelevant," according to Pedro Agramunt (Spain, EPP/CD), speaking today at the opening of a joint hearing on the subject of children of undocumented migrants organised by the PACE Sub-Committees on Migration and on Children.
03/10/2011 | Session
“Terrorism remains the greatest threat to the universal values of human rights. It must be considered a crime against humanity," the PACE President Mevlüt Cavusoglu said today in his opening speech of the PACE October session in Strasbourg, recalling the the massacre at Utoeya island youth camp, the bombing in Oslo and a recent bomb explosion in Ankara.
03/10/2011 | Session
When adopting the agenda of its plenary Autumn Session (3-7 October), the Assembly decided to hold an urgent debate on the political situation in the Balkans as well as a current affairs debate on the aid for countries touched by humanitarian catastrophes in East Africa. The debate on prenatal sex selection will take place this afternoon and the one on national sovereignty and statehood in contemporary international law, tomorrow evening. The President of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, will address the Assembly on Thursday 6 October.
03/10/2011 | Session
Addressing the Assembly for the last time as Chairman of the Committee of Ministers, Kostyantyn Gryshchenko welcomed democratic movements in the southern Mediterranean and stressed the Council of Europe’s readiness to help the region in its transition to democracy. "I hope that action plans with those countries where discussions are most advanced will be finalised soon so that these countries can rapidly benefit from the Organisation's expertise," he said.