21/03/2006 | Election observation
A thirty-seven-member, cross-party delegation from the PACE, headed by Renate Wohlwend (Liechtenstein, EPP/CD), will observe the 26 March parliamentary elections in Ukraine. The delegation, which will work alongside observers from the OSCE and NATO Parliamentary Assemblies and the European Parliament, will arrive in Kyiv on 23 March. They are due to meet party representatives, election officials and representatives of civil society and the media as well as observing polling on the day of the vote.
21/03/2006 | Migration, International Protection and Economic Co-operation
PACE's Migration Committee has called for "a constant vigil against discrimination, hate speech and stereotyping in the media". In a statement adopted on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the committee said it was particularly worried by the "stereotyping" of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers in the media. "The portrayal of ‘bogus’ or ‘scrounging’ applicants reinforces prejudices that these are dishonest people out to defraud the system," the parliamentarians said.
21/03/2006 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
"The Venice Commission has issued an excellent legal opinion that provides an important input for my inquiry on alleged secret detentions in Council of Europe member states," said Dick Marty, Rapporteur and Chair of the Assembly's Legal Affairs Committee, which requested the opinion in December 2005. Mr Marty said the 38-page text was "a thorough analysis of member states' international law and human rights obligations, highlighting standards developed by the European Human Rights and Anti-Torture Conventions. Secret detentions, abductions and irregular transport of detainees from or through Europe to countries where persons are at risk of torture are flagrant violations of these human rights standards". Mr Marty also indicated that he intends to present his report in June 2006.
21/03/2006 | Migration, International Protection and Economic Co-operation
"400 000 legal migrant workers have arrived in the United Kingdom within the last 18 months. An estimated 15 million regular and irregular migrants, mainly from former Soviet Republics, are said to currently reside in Russia. Whatever their exact number or status, migrant workers are a reality our governments will have to cope with increasingly in the forthcoming years," PACE rapporteur Doug Henderson (United Kingdom, SOC) said today at a hearing in Brussels on the situation of migrant workers in temporary employment agencies. "Increased mobility, 'open door policies' towards new EU member states as applied in the United Kingdom, Sweden and Ireland, together with the new CIS visa-free regime will create new employment partners in Europe. Therefore it becomes crucial to regulate temporary work as well as service provision," he added.
20/03/2006 | Migration, International Protection and Economic Co-operation
A hearing on the situation of migrant workers in temporary employment agencies, organised by the Assembly’s Migration Committee, will take place in Brussels on Tuesday 21 March. The hearing, in the framework of a coming report by Doug Henderson (United Kingdom, SOC), will look at case studies of migrant workers in Ireland, and from Russia and Ukraine, with the participation of trade union and employment agency representatives.
20/03/2006 | President
PACE President René van der Linden today expressed his bitter disappointment that the Assembly’s repeated calls for the Belarusian authorities to ensure free and fair presidential elections had gone unheeded. “As we feared, the OSCE’s preliminary findings have concluded that the election did not meet international standards,” said Mr van der Linden. “Through a combination of manipulative influence by the administration, a lack of freedom of expression and information, unequal access to campaigning opportunities, state control of the mass media, the frequently violent harassment of opposition candidates and supporters and an election administration that lacked independence, the Belarusian people were not permitted to choose their president through free expression of their political will.”
17/03/2006 | Standing Committee
The Parliamentary Assembly has strongly condemned the extensive and wide-ranging human rights abuses committed by the Franco regime in Spain from 1939 to 1975. In a recommendation adopted unanimously, the Standing Committee – which acts in the name of the Assembly between plenary sessions – called on the Council of Europe's Committee of Ministers to adopt a similar declaration at international level and to designate the 18 July 2006 as an official day of condemnation of the Franco regime. The report, by Leo Brincat (Malta, SOC), lists executions, torture and political prisoners as among abuses committed by the regime.
17/03/2006 | News
The Parliamentary Assembly has called for the preservation and development of Europe’s mining sites for cultural and environmental purposes as well as tourism and small businesses. “Without coalmining, Europe would never have played its part in the world,” said the Assembly’s Standing Committee in a resolution. Presenting the report, Jacques Legendre (France, EPP/CD) dedicated it to the memory of those who died in the mining disaster in Courrières, which took place exactly 100 years ago. The report, by Jean-Pierre Kucheida (France, SOC), also calls for the training of men and women from coalmining areas, solidarity with victims of mining accidents and further study of the “exemplary” social structures inherited from mining.
17/03/2006 | News
At a debate of the PACE Standing Committee today in Paris on a dynamic housing policy as an element of European social cohesion, rapporteur Denis Jacquat (France, EPP/CD) stressed that the right to housing as a fundamental social right secured in the revised Social Charter of the Council of Europe is the prime foundation for housing policies. "The Assembly must condemn once more the discriminatory practices, whether active or passive, that particularly affect Roma and families of African origin in certain Council of Europe member countries,“ said Mr Jacquat..
17/03/2006 | News
"Freedom of expression is not negotiable, a view that is shared Europe-wide. But while that freedom is not open to negotiation, it has never been synonymous with a right to insult the faith of others or to slander their belief", according to Jacques Legendre (France, EPP/CD), speaking at the opening of today's current affairs debate on freedom of expression and respect for religious beliefs, organised on the occasion of the meeting of the Standing Committee of the PACE. "And that freedom, if it is to be humanistic and respectful, must allow for the fact that the faith of a believer is absolute, and that true suffering may result if that absolute is denied or caricatured", Mr Legendre continued.
16/03/2006 | Political Affairs and Democracy
PACE's Sub-Committee on the Middle East has unanimously agreed to invite a delegation of the Palestinian Legislative Council, including a member of Hamas, to its next meeting which will be held during the April part-session (10-13 April 2006). "We cannot ignore the legitimate outcome of the parliamentary elections which took place on 25 January 2006," said the Sub-Committee’s Chairperson Stef Goris (Belgium, ADLE). "We all agree that the elections were fair and free. Therefore, we have to accept the democratically expressed will of the Palestinian people and do our best to involve those who won the elections in the political dialogue which could contribute to the peaceful settlement of the conflict."
14/03/2006 | Standing Committee
Following the controversy over the caricatures recently published in Denmark and the violent reactions in a number of countries, the Standing Committee of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) is poised to hold a debate (*) on the subject at its meeting on 17 March in Paris. In the view of PACE President René van der Linden, who will open the meeting at 9.30 am, "there cannot be a democratic society without the fundamental right to freedom of expression and information, but freedom of thought, conscience and religion constitutes one of the essential freedoms of individuals".