01/12/2005 | Prizes
The Council of Europe's Museum Prize for 2006 has been awarded to the Churchill Museum in London. The Museum, which opened in February 2005, was praised for its use of the latest technology to draw on the extensive archives in presentations that are readily accessible to older and younger generations. The Museum Prize has been awarded annually since 1977 to a museum judged to have made a significant contribution to the understanding of European cultural heritage.
30/11/2005 | Elections
A five-member, cross-party delegation of parliamentarians from PACE, headed by Tadeusz Iwinski (Poland, SOC), will observe the 4 December Presidential election in Kazakhstan alongside observers from the OSCE and the European Parliament.
30/11/2005 | Culture, Science, Education and Media
"With the presidential elections in 2006... the people of Belarus have the right to be informed independently and correctly about the situation in their country," said PACE's Sub-Committee on the Media in a declaration approved today. "Without free and independent media, these elections are doomed to be non-democratic." The sub-committee also called on the EU to remove constraints on broadcasting into Belarus.
29/11/2005 | President
Rene van der Linden, President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, today expressed his concern at reports that a peaceful demonstration by opposition supporters in Baku, Azerbaijan had been violently dispersed by the police. "I condemn any unjustified use of force against a peaceful political rally," said the President.
28/11/2005 | Monitoring
At its meeting in Paris on 23 November the Committee on the Honouring of Obligations and Commitments by Member States of the Council of Europe considered a memorandum submitted by the Rapporteur on Slovakia, Hanne Severinsen (Denmark, ALDE), and recommended the closure of post-monitoring dialogue. Having considered a memorandum submitted by the Rapporteur on Latvia, György Frunda (Romania, EPP/CD), the committee also recommended the closure of the post-monitoring dialogue for this country, and decided to prepare a revised memorandum for the next committee meeting.
28/11/2005 | Elections
The Council of Europe observers to the Constitutional Referendum held on 27 November 2005 in Armenia regret the decision taken by the authorities which precluded the attendance of any other international observers. The transparency of the referendum was further hampered by the decision of the parliamentary opposition to call on their members to withdraw from the electoral commissions. It is also regrettable that political pluralism inside polling stations was not better assisted by a greater number of domestic observers.
28/11/2005 | Standing Committee
The Parliamentary Assembly has called on Ukraine to respond favourably to Slovak proposals in order to create a new international border crossing in the village of Vel’ké Slemence/Mali Selmenci, on their common border, to end the consequences of the 1945 agreement which cut the village in two. According to a report adopted by the Assembly’s Standing Committee this week, Abolishing the last piece of the iron curtain in central Europe, “fifteen years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, an uncrossable boundary – armed sentries, double fencing, barbed wire and electric alarm systems – still traverses the main street… and people have to make a 50-mile journey to go from one part of the village to the other”.
25/11/2005 | News
In an information memorandum published today, Dick Marty, the PACE rapporteur who is investigating allegations about secret detention centres in Council of Europe member states, refers to suspicious movements by 31 aircraft allegedly belonging to entities with direct or indirect links to the CIA, and believed to have been used by the CIA to transport prisoners in the “war against terrorism”.
25/11/2005 | Standing Committee
On the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, the Standing Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), adopted the following statement at its meeting in Bucharest today: “Thousands of women face physical, sexual and psychological violence on a daily basis in Europe. Every day, one in five women in our continent is the victim of domestic abuse. The problem affects all member states of the Council of Europe and all socio-professional categories. Too many victims, however, suffer in silence and too many crimes go unpunished.
24/11/2005 | President
Corruption could “seriously jeopardize” Romania’s bid to join the European Union by 2007, the President of the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly has told Romanian Members of Parliament. In an address to Romania’s Parliament today, René van der Linden told MPs they should themselves set an example through their personal behaviour, by declaring their sources of income and any potential conflicts of interest.
24/11/2005 | News
An eight-member delegation from the Council of Europe was present in the Chechen Republic from 26 to 28 November 2005 on the occasion of the 27 November elections. The delegation – composed of five members of the Organisation’s Parliamentary Assembly and three members of its Congress of Local and Regional Authorities – gathered information on the situation in the Republic and will report back to these two bodies with its conclusions. It did not observe the elections.
24/11/2005 | News
Delegations from the Parliamentary Assembly and the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe will be in Armenia from 25 to 28 November to observe the constitutional referendum on 27 November 2005. During the visit, the delegations will meet Armenian President Robert Kocharyan, President of the National Assembly of Armenia Arthur Baghdasaryan, Chairman of the Central Election Commission Garegin Azaryan, as well as representatives of the media, NGOs and other international organisations.