The Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe will hold its 51st session from 27 to 29 October 2026 in Strasbourg, France. It will adopt Congress priorities for 2026-2031 and will debate early-warning instruments against democratic backsliding at local and regional levels, as a Congress contribution to the Council of Europe’s New Democratic Pact for Europe. The Congress will also adopt its contribution to the case of imprisoned Mayor of Istanbul İmamoğlu v. Türkiye before the European Court of Human Rights.
The session’s agenda features a debate on Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine and financing Ukraine’s recovery and reconstruction, with the participation of Ukraine’s Minister for Communities, Territories and Internally Displaced Persons Vitalii Bezghin, Governor of the Council of Europe Development Bank Carlo Monticelli and Managing Director for Corporate Strategy of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development William Roos; as well as debates on the role of regions in transfrontier cooperation and building democratic resilience in times of crisis, with the participation of Head of the Kherson Regional Military Administration Oleksandr Prokudin.
Congress members will exchange views with Council of Europe Secretary General Alain Berset and Interior Minister of Monaco Lionel Beffre, on behalf of his country’s Presidency of the Committee of Ministers.
Also addressing the session will be Slovenia’s Minister of Local Self-Government, Cohesion and Regional Development Monika Kirbiš Rojs; OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities Christophe Kamp; Member of Parliament from Gironde (France) Sophie Panonacle; Regional Minister for EU and External Foreign Action (Generalitat de Catalunya, Spain) Jaume Duch; Mayor of Capri (Italy) Paolo Falco; Mayor of Saint-Tropez (France) Sylvie Siri; Mayor of Guben (Germany) Fred Mahro; Mayor of Riccione (Italy) Daniela Angelini; Mayor of Asker (Norway) Lene Conradi; Deputy Mayor of Riga (Latvia) Māris Sprindžuks; as well as President of the Council of Europe’s Group of States against Corruption (GRECO) David Meyer, President of the Association of European Border Regions (AEBR) Joris Bengevoord, Mayor of Adıyaman and Member of the Executive Board of the Union of Municipalities of Türkiye (TBB) Abdurrahman Tutdere, Chair of the European Cross-Border Platform of the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) Pavel Branda, Managing Director of Rainbow Cities Network Manuel Rosas Vazquez, CoR Rapporteur on the European Democracy Shield Stephen De Ron, and Lecturer at the Global Studies Institute of University of Geneva (Switzerland) Claude Barbier.
Other highlights include debates on guaranteeing the freedoms to speak and to meet for LGBTI persons in local communities, coping with coastal erosion due to rising sea levels, tackling school absenteeism, demographic decline as a challenge for territories, overtourism and depopulation, creating new opportunities for rural communities suffering from regional exodus, the cost of crises: financing local resilience, and on contested memories: how local and regional authorities can manage controversial cultural heritage.
The Congress will also debate reports on the application of the European Charter of Local Self-Government in Albania, Switzerland and the smallest States, as well as and on the observation of elections for the President of Republika Srpska (Bosnia and Herzegovina), local elections in the Netherlands, partial elections in 10 municipalities of Serbia, as well as local elections in England and elections for the Scottish and Welsh Parliaments in the United Kingdom.
On Friday 23 October at 2pm, Congress Secretary General Mathieu Mori will hold a hybrid press briefing (online and offline) in Room 15 of the Palais de l’Europe in Strasbourg, to present the session’s agenda. The presentation will be made in English. Please contact the Congress Communication Unit or Tatiana Baeva-Frachon (contact details provided below) to request the link for the online press briefing and to receive draft copies of the Congress documents.
The Congress session is open to media upon prior accreditation.
The session can be followed live in English, French, German, Italian, Turkish (all debates), Spanish (all plenary debates), and Ukrainian (some debates) at https://www.coe.int/en/web/portal/home and https://www.coe.int/congress.
The draft agenda and session documents (reports to be debated and adopted texts) as well as video recordings of each sitting and photos are available on the dedicated Session page. News items on debates also appear on the Congress home page.
Social media: Follow the official Congress accounts on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Bluesky and X.
Contacts:
Congress Communication Unit, +33 (0)3 88 41 38 90
Tatiana Baeva-Frachon, Media and Communications Advisor, Media Department, Council of Europe, +33 3 88 41 21 41 or +33 685 11 64 93.
