The Council of Europe is the regional organisation that embraces 47 States of the European continent, namely all but Belorus.
The Council of Europe is the regional organisation that embraces 47 States of the European continent, namely all but Belorus. Its aim is protecting human rights, democracy and the rule of law in the whole continent. In order to perform this task the Council Europe promotes the elaboration and the ratification of international conventions, such as the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and the Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence.
The Council of Europe performs its tasks through different bodies.
The Parliamentary Assembly reunites the representatives of the Parliaments of the 47 Member States and provides a forum to discuss current issues on human rights. It adopts non biding texts addressed to Member States and monitors their progress in the same field.
The Committee of Ministers is the deciding body of the Council of Europe. It is composed by the ministers of foreign affairs of Member States. As the Parliamentary Assembly, it adopts non biding texts addressed to Member States on topics that fall in the field of competences of the Council of Europe.
The European Court of Human Rights is a permanent judicial body which monitors the respect of the European Convention on Human Rights. All the Member States have ratified the Convention and may be called before the European Court to respond to alleged violations of the rights set forth in the Convention. All individuals may address their complaints to the Court regardless of nationality.
The Commissioner for Human Rights addresses specific topics related to human rights in an independent way and reports to the other CoE’s bodies and Member States.
Useful links
The Council of Europe: www.coe.int
The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe: http://assembly.coe.int
The Committee of Ministers: www.coe.int/T/CM/home_en.asp
The European Court of Human Rights: www.echr.coe.int
The Commissioner for Human Rights: www.coe.int/en/web/commissioner