The Panel’s mandate is to advise the High Contracting Parties whether candidates for election as judge to the European Court of Human Rights meet the criteria stipulated in Article 21(1) of the Convention which reads as follows:

“The judges shall be of high moral character and must either possess the qualifications required for appointment to high judicial office or be jurisconsults of recognised competence.”         

The creation of the Advisory Panel was part of the implementation of the Interlaken Declaration of 19 February 2010 which called on the High Contracting Parties to ensure “full satisfaction of the Convention’s criteria for office as a judge of the Court, including knowledge of public international law and of the national legal systems as well as proficiency in at least one official language.”

According to Article 22 of the European Convention on Human Rights the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has exclusive competence for electing the Court’s judges, but the quality of those judges depends in the first place on the quality of the candidates that are nominated by the States Parties. If a list is not composed of qualified candidates, the most that the Assembly can do is to reject it.

Article 22 of the Convention states that “The judges shall be elected by the Parliamentary Assembly with respect to each High Contracting Party by a majority of votes cast from a list of three candidates nominated by the High Contracting Party.”

In order to obtain the Panel’s opinion, the Governments shall provide the Panel with the names and curricula vitae of the three candidates selected at national level prior to their submission to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. After having given its confidential opinion to the Government concerned, the Panel also informs the Parliamentary Assembly in a confidential manner of its opinion.