26/01/2010 | Session
Strasbourg, 26.01.2010 - The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), meeting this week in plenary session in Strasbourg, today elected Guido Raimondi as judge to the European Court of Human Rights with respect to Italy. Judges are elected by PACE from a list of three candidates nominated by each State which has ratified the European Convention on Human Rights.
26/01/2010 | Session
"Close co-operation between Council of Europe, European Union and OSCE is absolutely necessary towards the globalisation of human rights", the Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs highlighted the relevance of international organisations’ co-ordination, in order to strengthen fundamental rights’ protection in Europe, and especially a common governance on migrations’ policies. Franco Frattini stressed the importance of the European identity, and confirmed the country’s engagement in working for women’s rights. In the framework of the Council of Europe core-business, a final mention has been for the Italian input on the 20th anniversary of the Venice Commission and the recent Presidency of the North-South Centre in Lisbon.
26/01/2010 | Session
While emphasising the uniqueness of our common institutions and practices, the Prime Minister of Greece said that they neither could nor should be taken for granted. Media concentration, the need for greater global awareness of environmental issues and the use of diversity to create new bonds of solidarity: these are all challenges facing democracy. Greater protection of the rights of minorities and an end to conflicts are also vital to achieving a more integrated Europe. 'The world needs more Europe today, not less', he concluded.
26/01/2010 | Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development
"Are decisions on pandemics taken on the best scientific evidence only?" was the question asked at a January public hearing of PACE's Committee on Social, Health and Family Affairs which looked into the handling of the H1N1 pandemic. The World Health Organisation's flu chief defended his...
25/01/2010 | Session
Presenting his political reform plan to the Parliamentary Assembly on 25 January, the Secretary General said the Council of Europe should be "a lighthouse for Europe" by anticipating social and political crises, and by providing solutions. He said that the reform aims to revitalise the organisation as a political and innovative body, to make it more flexible and visible, and to concentrate on high added value projects.
25/01/2010 | Session
While underlining that the entry into force of Protocol 14 represented a big breath of air for the European Court of Human Rights, the Committee of Ministers' Chairperson insisted on the need to look beyond. She also welcomed the Secretary General's draft reform of the Organisation and of the full support of the Ministers' Deputies.
25/01/2010 | Session
At the opening of its plenary Winter Session, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) today elected its Vice-Presidents. The seat of Vice-President in respect of Ukraine remains vacant.
25/01/2010 | Session
PACE 318-member today elected Mevlüt Çavusoglu (Turkey, EDG) as its new President at the opening of its plenary session in Strasbourg (25-29 January). Mr Çavusoglu succeeds Lluís Maria de Puig (Spain, SOC) as the Assembly’s 25th President. He is the first Turk to hold the office since Turkey’s accession to the Council of Europe in August 1949. “I come from a country which has prided itself for two millennia on being a bridge between continents,” Mevlüt Çavusoglu said in his first speech as PACE President.
25/01/2010 | Session
At the opening of its Winter plenary session (25-29 January 2010) in Strasbourg this morning, the Assembly decided to hold a current affairs debate on what Europe can do for Haiti, an item that will be debated on Thursday morning, and to debate the challenge of the credentials of the parliamentary delegations of Albania and Armenia, a question which will be discussed the same day. Other highlights of the session include debates on discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, the situation in the Middle East (with statements by Daniel Ayalon, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel, and Mohammad Shtayyeh, Minister of Public Works and Housing of the Palestinian National Authority) and action against trafficking in human beings. Prominent personalities due to address the Assembly include George A. Papandreou, Prime Minister of Greece.
22/01/2010 | Equality and Non-Discrimination
As part of a parliamentary debate on action against trafficking in human beings and the need to promote the Council of Europe convention on trafficking, the PACE Committee on Equal Opportunities for Women and Men will hold an exchange of views open to the press, in the presence of Nikolay Mikhaylovich Rantsev, the father of a victim of trafficking, and his lawyer, on Tuesday 26 January. The meeting will be followed by a press conference.
21/01/2010 | Political Affairs and Democracy
PACE Rapporteur on the Middle East Piero Fassino (Italy, SOC) has called on Israelis and Palestinians to re-start negotiations as soon as possible. Speaking in Jerusalem at the end of a four-day visit to the region, during which he met President Shimon Peres and President Abu Mazen, Mr Fassino said: “We cannot accept an unending conflict in the Middle East. Thanks to President Obama’s initiative, there is a new opportunity for peace. We must not let it go by.” He said that in spite of difficulties, there were signals all agreed on, which showed peace was possible. The Assembly is to debate Mr Fassino’s report in Strasbourg on Tuesday 26 January.
21/01/2010 | Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development
Strasbourg, 21.01.2010 – A public parliamentary hearing titled “The handling of the H1N1 pandemic: more transparency needed?” is to be held on the fringe of the plenary session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in Strasbourg from 8.15-10 a.m. on Tuesday 26 January...