11/02/2010 | President
Immediately after his election as President of PACE, Mevlüt Çavusoglu visited Ahmet Davutoglu, the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs in Ankara. He thanked him for his support and kind visit to Strasbourg on 29 January. The President said that their talks had concentrated on the important reforms which have been made by Turkey. He added that he firmly believed that the reforms will continue successfully and that PACE will do its utmost to assist Turkey in this process. “As far as the the Council of Europe's reform process is concerned, I have asked for Turkey's support,” he concluded.
11/02/2010 | President
During their official visit to Turkey, the Speaker of the Georgian Parliament, David Bakradze and his parliamentary delegation met with PACE President Mevlüt Çavusoglu in Ankara on 9 February. Mutual goodwill and the intention to co-operate were at the heart of their discussions, the PACE President said. Mr Çavusoglu also announced that he was very pleased to accept the official invitation by the Georgian Speaker to visit Georgia.
10/02/2010 | Equality and Non-Discrimination
“I am appalled and outraged by the murder of a 16-year-old girl recently committed in Turkey, in the name of so-called ‘honour’”, said José Mendes Bota (Portugal, EPP/CD), Chairperson of the PACE Committee on Equal Opportunities for Women and Men, speaking today. “The torture suffered by this young girl, buried alive, is intolerable. There is no honour in so-called ‘honour crimes’, and no tradition or culture can invoke any kind of honour to violate women’s fundamental rights”, he added.
10/02/2010 | Monitoring
Joseph Debono Grech (Malta, SOC) and Andres Herkel (Estonia, EPP/CD) started yesterday a fact-finding visit to Azerbaijan in view to finalise their report on the honouring of obligations and commitments by Azerbaijan vis-à-vis the Council of Europe.
10/02/2010 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Christos Pourgourides (Cyprus, EPP/CD), PACE rapporteur of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on the implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, has just ended a visit to Moscow (7-10 February 2010) with a call to the Russian authorities to make a renewed effort to speedily implement Strasbourg Court judgments, notably those relating to repetitive and structural violations, as well as grave human right violations.
08/02/2010 | Elections
Ukraine's run-off presidential election confirmed the international election observation mission's assessment that the electoral process met most OSCE and Council of Europe commitments. In a statement issued today, the observers noted that the election consolidated progress achieved since 2004. "Some say the Orange Revolution has failed. I say no. Thanks to the Orange Revolution, democratic elections in Ukraine are now a reality," said Matyas Eörsi, Head of PACE delegation.
05/02/2010 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
Christos Pourgourides (Cyprus, EPP/CD), rapporteur of PACE Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights, will make a fact-finding visit to Moscow on 8 and 9 February as part of the preparation of his report on the implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights. The cases considered by Mr Pourgourides cover those which raise serious implementation issues.
04/02/2010 | President
Mevlüt Çavusoglu, PACE President today welcomed the creation, by the Belarus parliament, of a working group “on the issue of death penalty as an instrument of punishment” composed by members of both chambers. He encouraged the working group to examine experience of Council of Europe member states in this field as it showed that there were no valid reasons to maintain the death penalty. “This is a positive step in the right direction. PACE stands ready to assist the Belarus parliament in this process,” he said.
02/02/2010 | Monitoring
“The Armenian authorities need to implement the reforms recommended by the ad hoc Committee of the National Assembly of Armenia on the events of 1 and 2 March 2008, without further delay,” concluded PACE co-rapporteurs, John Prescott (United Kingdom, SOC) and Georges Colombier (France, EPP/CD), following an exchange of views in the PACE Monitoring Committee last week. “The reforms recommended by the ad hoc Committee, in combination with those contained in the relevant PACE resolutions, if implemented in good faith, could comprehensively address the circumstances that led to the events of 1 and 2 March 2008,” the co-rapporteurs said.
02/02/2010 | Elections
A 30-member PACE delegation, led by Mátyás Eörsi (Hungary, ALDE), will be in Ukraine from 5 to 8 February to observe the second round of the presidential election, alongside observers from the OSCE and NATO Parliamentary Assemblies, the European Parliament and the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR). The delegation will meet the two candidates, the head of the election observation mission of OSCE/ODIHR and her team, the Central Electoral Commission and civil society and media representatives before observing the ballot on 7 February in a sample of polling stations across the country.
29/01/2010 | President
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu today met the President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) Mevlüt Çavusoglu at the end of the Assembly’s plenary session in Strasbourg. He congratulated the President on his election. Mr Çavusoglu is the 25th President of PACE, and the first Turk to hold this position.
29/01/2010 | Session
At the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, 179 countries adopted a Twenty-year Programme of Action, which focused on individuals’ needs and rights rather than on achieving demographic targets. Sixteen years later, the Assembly today noted that “while some progress has been made, achievements on education enrolment, gender equity and equality, infant child and maternal mortality and morbidity and the provision of universal access to sexual and reproductive health services, including family planning and safe abortion services, remain mixed”.