The Fundamental Right Agency (FRA) together with the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) is launching a survey on women’s well-being and safety in Europe. The survey’s aim is to collect comprehensive data about domestic violence among 40,000 women who will be interviewed. The survey will focus not only on the experience of violence but [...]

Governments want to “amend” the European Convention on Human Rights. If the worst-case scenario comes true, it will undermine the integrity and authority of the European Court of Human Rights, and lead to the slow dismantling of the European system of human rights protection. The UK Chairmanship of the Council of Europe will hold a [...]

A few days ago, on the occasion of the new own-initiative report, the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) held a public hearing entitled “What is new on the alleged CIA illegal detention and transfers of prisoners in Europe?” The hearing showed that there was still a lot of resistance [...]

In the recent weeks Europe was shaken by the signature of ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement). While Europe’s eyes are turned upon fighting with copyrights abuses, EU is proceeding with another agreement which might have a negative impact on human rights. On 13 December 2011 the Council has agreed to conclude the EU-US Passenger Name Record [...]

With the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty all Member States agreed that the EU should become a High Contracting Party to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). In light of this obligation it is alarming that the accession is currently being sidetracked by political objections from the UK and France. On 25 January 2012, [...]

The week of 23 – 27 January was very important as far as human rights in Europe are concerned. Effectiveness of the ECHR The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly had their weekly session. Parliamentarians started with the adoption of the report of the effectiveness of the European Convention of Human Rights protection system. The report [...]

On 25 January 2012 David Cameron, the British Prime Minister, gave a speech during the meeting of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. The speech was on one hand full of compassion over the raising backlog of cases pending before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), on the other hand it stressed [...]

Websites of Polish authorities are under attack. The entire Internet community is outraged. There are plans of protests in the streets. A number of sites in a gesture of solidarity have scheduled blackouts. This is all in reaction to the news that on January 26 the Polish minister of foreign affairs will sign the Anti-Counterfeiting [...]

The situation in Hungary seems to be more and more alarming. The ruling party FIDESZ, headed by Victor Orban, is undertaking legislative initiatives which have a degrading impact on respect of human rights and democratic standards. The recent developments, mainly the reform of the Central Bank, despite the negative assessment of the European Commission may [...]

On 16th December 2011, Polish Supreme Administrative Court declared that “amounts of money” paid for undue length of civil or criminal proceedings should be exempted from taxation. Those amounts are paid on the basis of special law of 2004 on complaint on excessive length of proceeding (skarga na przewlekłość postępowania). Tax authorities had unclear approach [...]

For decades Europe has fallen victim to different terrorist attacks. The policy of increased judicial cooperation between member states had already been agreed in Tampere Programme of 1999. A Council Framework Decision 2002/475/JHA on combating terrorism was adopted on 13 June 2002. The anti-terrorism policy has been extended after the 2004 bombings in Madrid, the [...]

On 13 December 2011 the Council gave its consent to the signing of a new EU-US agreement on Passenger Name Records (PNR). From the Council’s press release we learn that it will replace the existing one, which has been provisionally applied since 2007, and that now it is the European Parliament that has to give [...]

In August 2011 Polish prosecution transferred to Belarus bank account information of Ales Bialatsky. On the basis of the information obtained by Belarusian authorities Bialatsky was sentenced to 4.5 years in a high security prison and his assets were confiscated. Today (12 December 2011) Polish airport border guard detained Ales Michalewicz. He was pursued with [...]

Last week, during the EU-Russia Civil Society Forum, numerous representatives of civil society from Russia and the EU met in Warsaw. They were discussing latest democratic developments in Russia and the protection of human rights. Russian authorities are encouraging citizens to participate in tomorrow’s elections to the Russian Duma (Parliament). The media present these elections [...]

On 30th November the Belarusian court will pronounce the death penalty to two Belarussians, Dzmitry Kanavalau and Uladzislau Kavalyou. On April 11th, an explosion tore through a Minsk subway, 14 people were killed and over 200 were injured. This terrible event was followed by, what many believe, an unfair and sensational trial without hard evidence [...]