09/12/2009 | Migration, International Protection and Economic Co-operation
The use of detention as a response to the arrival of asylum seekers and irregular immigrants has significantly increased in Council of Europe member states and resulted in mass and needless detention. According to a report adopted by the PACE Migration Committee in Paris on 9 December, capacity had risen 10-fold since the early 1990s in the United Kingdom, France had increased it from 739 in 2003 to 1724 in 2007, Italy’s Lampedusa centre counted 1800 detainees instead of the 800 it has capacity for.
08/12/2009 | Culture, Science, Education and Media
“We cannot continue to offer exclusive protection for copyright in an open and global society, where the new opportunities afforded by the Internet have led to the wide dissemination of creative works,” said today José Luis Arnaut (Portugal, EPP/CD), rapporteur of the Parliamentary Assembly's Committee on Culture. “We now have to strike a balance between an adequate level of remuneration for the creative effort, the right to privacy, freedom of expression and access to information,” he added.
08/12/2009 | Culture, Science, Education and Media
Andrew McIntosh (United Kingdom, SOC), rapporteur of PACE Committee on Culture, on respect for media freedom, said he was shocked by the increase in attacks on journalists and media – at least twenty journalists have been killed since 2007 in Europe, including thirteen in Russia.“It is important to collate information on violations of media freedom on a continuing basis, to analyse this information systematically country by country and disseminate it to the governments of member states and to the media,” said Andrew McIntosh. "We need to draw as much attention as possible to these violations," he added.
08/12/2009 | Equality and Non-Discrimination
Should women facing gender-based violence in their home countries be entitled to seek asylum in Europe? What types of persecution do women, in particular face, which cause them to seek asylum? How can traffickers be stopped from exploiting them? Are Council of Europe member states accountable, beyond their borders, for the violations of fundamental rights of migrant women living in Europe? These and other questions will be debated at a parliamentary conference on “Migration and violence against women in Europe” in Paris on 10 and 11 December 2009, attended by some 80 parliamentarians and experts from around 25 countries.
08/12/2009 | Prizes
The Council of Europe Museum Prize for 2010 has been awarded to the Portimão Museum in Algarve in Portugal. The committee's decision was motivated by the success story of the museum, the relevance of its theme and the extent of its educational programme to the benefit of the local community. The Portimão Museum housed in a former sardine canning factory on the estuary of the Arade River has successfully restored the industrial/historical heritage of the Portimão area.
07/12/2009 | Monitoring
Josette Durrieu (France, SOC) and Egidijus Vareikis (Lithuania, EPP/CD), co-rapporteurs of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) for the monitoring of the obligations and commitments of Moldova, today made the following statement: "We have taken note of the results of the second round of the presidential election in Moldova, which took place today, and we note that the institutional deadlock continues."
04/12/2009 | Monitoring
As part of the post-monitoring dialogue with Bulgaria, Serhiy Holovaty (Ukraine, ALDE), Chair of PACE Monitoring Committee, will travel to Sofia on 7-8 December on a fact-finding visit. This will include meetings with the President of the National Assembly Tsetska Tsacheva, the Minister of the Interior Tsvetan Tsvetanov, the Minister of Justice Margarita Popova, the President of the Supreme Court Lazar Gruev and the Chief Prosecutor Boris Velchev.
04/12/2009 | Monitoring
Renate Wohlwend (Liechtenstein, EPP/CD), PACE co-rapporteur on the honouring of obligations and commitments by Ukraine, will make a fact-finding visit to Kyiv on 7-8 December, during which she will examine the legal framework for the presidential elections on 17 January 2010, and take stock of the reform of the Prokuratura (Office of the Public Prosecutor), the reform of the judiciary and the drafting of a unified election code.
04/12/2009 | President
"PACE represents the most representative pan-European political forum to discuss initiatives and proposals by member states regarding European and world affairs," declared Lluís Maria de Puig during his meeting with Sergei Mironov, Chairman of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation held on 3 December 2009 in Saint Petersburg. In this connection, Mr de Puig announced his intention to invite the President of the Russian Federation, Dmitri Medvedev, to present before the parliamentarians of the 47 member states his recent initiatives concerning the new European Security Architecture as well as the creation of an international tribunal on the acts of piracy.
03/12/2009 | Migration, International Protection and Economic Co-operation
“The developments over the last 24 hours in solving the plight of the four teenagers detained in Tskhinvali, and the five ethnic Ossetians held by the Georgian authorities, are to be welcomed,” said Corien Jonker (Netherlands, EPP/CD), PACE rapporteur on the humanitarian consequences of the war between Georgia and Russia. “The release has not come too soon, and although two of the four teenagers are still in detention, the indications are that they too will be released in the near future.”
03/12/2009 | News
STRASBOURG, 05.01.2000 - "The decision of the Ukrainian Constitutional Court that the death penalty is unconstitutional and can therefore no longer be applied, is a welcome step forward in the honouring of Ukraine's obligations and commitments as a member state of the Council of Europe. I trust that this decision will soon be followed by the formal ratification of Protocol 6 to the European Human Rights Convention concerning the abolition of the death penalty," said Lord RUSSELL-JOHNSTON, President of the COUNCIL OF EUROPE Parliamentary Assembly.
30/11/2009 | President
“Although it expresses the popular will, the decision to ban the construction of new minarets in Switzerland is a source of profound concern to me”, said PACE President, Lluís Maria de Puig, commenting today on the referendum of 28 November. “On the one hand, this position reflects fears within the Swiss population – and the population of Europe as a whole – regarding Islamic fundamentalism; on the other, far from helping to tackle the causes of fundamentalism, it is likely to encourage feelings of exclusion and deepen the rifts in our societies”, he added.