Newsroom
Secretary General addresses 56th Joint Meeting of Council of Europe Development Bank in Athens
Addressing the 56th Joint Meeting of the Council of Europe Development Bank (CEB), Secretary General Marija Pejčinović Burić underlined the CEB’s actions and their positive impact across its member states. Speaking at the event in Athens, the Secretary General welcomed the decision made last year...
Poland must take further steps to tackle human trafficking, say Council of Europe experts
The Council of Europe’s Group of Experts on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings (GRETA) has urged the Polish authorities to take further action against human trafficking, notably by effectively preventing and combating trafficking for the purpose of labour exploitation and improving the...
Hungary: anti-corruption group calls for measures to prevent corruption in central government and law enforcement
The Council of Europe’s Group of States against Corruption (GRECO), in a new report, calls for determined measures to prevent corruption in Hungary in respect of persons with top executive functions, including the Prime Minister, ministers, commissioners, political state secretaries, political...
Council of Europe leaders profoundly concerned about Russia’s non-execution of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, including the non-payment of just satisfaction
The Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers has reiterated the Russian Federation’s unconditional legal obligation to implement judgments of the European Court of Human Rights and to pay ‘just satisfaction’ awarded by the Court. The President of the Committee of Ministers made a statement on...
Implementing ECHR judgments: Latest decisions from the Committee of Ministers
The Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers has published the case-by-case decisions taken during the Committee’s meeting from 5 to 7 June to supervise the implementation of judgments and decisions from the European Court of Human Rights. The Committee of Ministers adopted 38 decisions...
National minorities: Council of Europe and OSCE join forces to raise awareness of human rights standards
Marija Pejčinović Burić, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, has met Kairat Abdrakhmanov, the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities, to officially launch the joint web resource “Collection of Council of Europe and OSCE National Minority Standards”. The webpage, an example of...
Minority languages situation in Austria and Serbia: new reports published
The Committee of Experts of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML) has published new reports on Austria and Serbia. The reports provide a general evaluation of the situation and contain snapshots of the situation of each language covered by the Charter, assessing whether...
Destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam in the Kherson region of Ukraine: statement by Council of Europe leaders
The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Latvia and Council of Europe’s President of the Committee of Ministers, Edgars Rinkēvičs, the President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Tiny Kox and the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Marija Pejčinović Burić made the...
Social reintegration of offenders in prison and under probation: Berlin conference explores innovative responses
The Council of Europe annual Conference of Directors of Prison and Probation Services, held in Berlin on 6 and 7 June, is exploring innovative responses to challenges such as the increasing number of people with mental health problems in prison or under the supervision of probation agencies,...
Council of Europe anti-trafficking body urges Azerbaijan to better identify victims of human trafficking and improve their access to compensation and other remedies
In a new report the Council of Europe’s Group of Experts on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings assesses developments since the publication of GRETA’s second evaluation report on Azerbaijan in November 2018 as regards the implementation of the Council of Europe’s Convention on Action...
Implementing European Court of Human Rights judgments
The Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers is holding its quarterly meeting to oversee the execution of judgments and decisions from the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg from 5 to 7 June. Cases proposed for detailed examination concern Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina,...
Support to young people from Ukraine: call for grant applications continues
The European Youth Foundation (EYF) has decided to continue and expand the special call for activities to support young people from Ukraine. The call now includes possibilities for international youth co-operation projects. An information session will take place on 7 June. Applications can be...
Consequences of Russia’s war against Ukraine, mixed picture with LGBTI persons’ rights, antigypsyism and shrinking space for civil society - Council of Europe anti-racism body presented key trends in Europe in 2022
Addressing the challenges posed by Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, addressing continued discrimination – despite certain progress - of LGBTI persons, Roma and Travellers, as well as the need for supporting civil society actors were the main thematic clusters of issues European...
Secretary General’s lecture at Comenius University in Bratislava: “Summit in Reykjavik will be remembered as a turning point”
“There are good reasons to believe that our recent Summit in Reykjavik will be remembered as a turning point”, highlighted Secretary General Marija Pejčinović Burić while addressing students, the diplomatic academy and a wider public at Comenius University in Bratislava. In her lecture “Human...
The Committee of Ministers calls on member states to recognise the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment as a human right
In a Recommendation on human rights and the protection of the environment, the Council of Europe calls on its 46 member states to actively consider recognising, at national level, the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, as a human right. Considering that measures to address the...
Helga Pedersen Human Rights Moot Court Competition: 11th anniversary
Students from the University of Maastricht (the Netherlands) were declared winners of the eleventh edition of the Helga Pedersen Moot Court Competition in English on the European Convention on Human Rights, after beating a team from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Greece) in...
In Türkiye’s presidential runoff, a competitive campaign continued to be marked by lack of level playing field and media bias, say international observers
The second round of Türkiye’s presidential election was well run and gave voters the opportunity to choose between real political alternatives, but was characterized by increasingly inflammatory and discriminatory language during the campaign period. Media bias and ongoing restrictions to freedom...
Secretary General visits the Slovak Republic and attends GLOBSEC 2023 Bratislava Forum
Secretary General Marija Pejčinović Burić has met President Zuzana Čaputová during an official visit to the Slovak Republic. Meetings with Minister of Foreign and European Affairs Miroslav Wlachovský, with Vice President of the European Commission Věra Jourová and with President of the Supreme...
Statutes of limitation for sexual offences against children and “age of consent” in Council of Europe member states
In the context of an ongoing debate and diverse approaches to statutes of limitations in respect of sexual offences against children and the legal age for sexual activities, commonly known as the “age of consent”, in Council of Europe member states, the Lanzarote Committee (Committee of the...
National minorities in the UK: European experts report troubling levels of antigypsyism and the need to further support linguistic minorities
The Council of Europe’s expert body on the rights of national minorities has highlighted troublingly persistent levels of antigypsyism in the United Kingdom, as well as racial and ethnic bullying in schools. Linguistic minorities also need greater levels of support. These are among the main...
