23/11/2004 | News
The Chairman of the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz, the President of the Parliamentary Assembly Peter Schieder and the Secretary General Terry Davis express their deep concern about the irregularities observed during the presidential elections in Ukraine. These irregularities have increased significantly in the second round as confirmed by numerous independent observers and increased considerably the risk of a serious political crisis in Ukraine because many Ukrainians do not accept the results announced by the Ukrainian Central Election Commission.
23/11/2004 | News
PACE President today urged his fellow-parliamentarians and European leaders to be on the alert for, and to take action against, the resurgence of racist and xenophobic acts in Europe. At a meeting of the PACE Bureau and Standing Committee in Warsaw - on topics including preparations for the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, to be commemorated in the Assembly Chamber on 27 January 2005 - Mr Schieder expressed his regret that 60 years after the liberation of Auschwitz it was still necessary to fight racism, xenophobia, antisemitism and intolerance.
23/11/2004 | News
The Bureau of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) meeting in Warsaw today, stressed the importance of the organisation of the election of a successor to Yasser Arafat. It decided to send a delegation to observe the election of the President of the Palestinian Authority.
23/11/2004 | Standing Committee
The situation in Belarus, as we can see every day, blocks the fulfilment of the very mission of the Council of Europe which was set up in order to ensure greater unity in Europe on the basis of common values, said PACE President Peter Schieder, speaking today during a debate on the situation in Belarus at a meeting of the PACE Standing Committee in Warsaw.
22/11/2004 | News
The second round of the presidential election in Ukraine on 21 November did not meet a considerable number of OSCE commitments, Council of Europe and other European standards for democratic elections. As in the first round, state executive authorities and the Central Election Commission displayed a lack of will to conduct a genuine democratic election process, concluded the International Election Observation Mission.
19/11/2004 | President
PACE President Peter Schieder today called on the Ukrainian authorities to ensure that the decisive second round of the presidential election on Sunday 21 November is in accordance with Council of Europe standards. The President in particular stressed that it was the responsibility of the Ukrainian authorities to remedy the shortcomings found by the International Election Observation Mission (IEOM) during the first round of the presidential election and take all appropriate measures to reduce the risk of fraud. A 20-member PACE delegation will observe the second round in the framework of an IEOM, composed of delegations from the Council of Europe, OSCE and NATO Parliamentary Assemblies, the European Parliament and the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE-ODIHR).
18/11/2004 | News
The PACE Standing Committee met in Warsaw on Tuesday 23 November at the invitation of the Polish Parliament. The meeting was opened by PACE President Peter Schieder and the Speaker of the Sejm Jόzef Oleksy. The participants held an exchange of views with Polish Foreign Minister Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz, Chairman of the Committee of Ministers of the 46-nation Organisation, which focused on the 3rd Summit of Heads and State and Government, which will be held in Warsaw under the Polish chairmanship on 16-17 May 2005. In the framework of the Council of Europe’s increased efforts to combat terrorism, the parliamentarians adopted a text on ‘combating terrorism through culture’.
18/11/2004 | Election observation
A 20-member delegation of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) will observe the second round of the presidential election to be held in Ukraine on 21 November 2004. The parliamentarians will arrive in Kyiv on 19 November to meet with the two candidates and the Chair of the Central Electoral Commission. On election day, they will be deployed in the capital and throughout the country. The observation will be carried out in the framework of an International Election Observation Mission (IEOM), composed of delegations of Council of Europe, OSCE and NATO Parliamentary Assemblies, the European Parliament and the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE-ODIHR).
17/11/2004 | Legal Affairs and Human Rights
The circumstances surrounding the arrest and prosecution of leading Yukos executives strongly suggest that they were “arbitrarily singled out” by the Russian authorities, according to PACE’s Legal Affairs Committee. The state's action went beyond the mere pursuit of justice to include such elements as “to weaken an outspoken political opponent, intimidate other wealthy individuals and regain control of strategic economic assets”, said the committee, adopting a report by Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger (Germany, LDR) today in Paris. The report is due for plenary debate by the Assembly in 2005, possibly at its January session.
17/11/2004 | Political Affairs and Democracy
PACE’s Political Affairs Committee has called on the Parliament of Israel, which holds observer status with the Assembly, to facilitate the proper conduct of the forthcoming Palestinian presidential election, in particular the free movement of persons. Adopting a statement during a meeting in Paris, the committee also said the Assembly should observe the election. The coming period was “crucial for the Palestinian people”, the parliamentarians said.
16/11/2004 | Political Affairs and Democracy
PACE's Political Affairs Committee has spelled out a series of steps Armenia and Azerbaijan could take to fulfill their commitment to settle the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict peacefully. But in a report adopted this week, the committee also expressed concern at the creation of "mono-ethnic areas which resemble the terrible concept of ethnic cleansing" and said displaced persons should be able to return to their homes safely and with dignity. The report may be discussed at the Assembly's January session.
15/11/2004 | President
"The Council of Europe is the guardian of what has been called 'democratic security'. This may be seen as a complement to military security, and I would say an equally essential pre-requisite for the continent’s freedom, stability and peace", PACE President Peter Schieder said addressing the 50th annual session of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly in Venice today. He stressed that it was perhaps time to consider extending the death-penalty-free zone of the 46 Council of Europe member states to the whole North Atlantic area, which is supposed to be, after all, a community of shared values.