The new Drafting Group on the Protection of the Right to Vote and to Stand for Election under the ECHR (CDDH-VOTE) held its first meeting in Strasbourg from 21 to 23 September 2026, marking the start of its study on electoral rights under the European Convention on Human Rights.
Meeting under the chairmanship of Krista Oinonen (Finland), the Group elected Alfonso BREZMES (Spain) as Vice-Chair and appointed Andreea IVANOV (Romania) as rapporteur.
The Group agreed on its working methods and discussed its terms of reference, before exchanging views with independent experts and representatives of the European Court of Human Rights, the Venice Commission and other relevant bodies on issues relating to electoral rights under the European Convention. In the coming weeks a compilation of the experts’ presentations will be made available in the CDDH-VOTE List of documents on the CDDH-VOTE webpage.
The Group also discussed the study it has been tasked with preparing. It asked its rapporteur to prepare a draft text for discussion at its next meeting and invited the Delegations to submit written comments on the draft text a week before the meeting.
