Brussels, 29/05/2012 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 24 May, the European Parliament (EP) foreign affairs committee adopted the report by Laima Liucija Andrikiene (EPP, Lithuania) on the Parliament's recommendations to the Council on the EU Special Representative for Human Rights. The committee says the special representative should increase the visibility, effectiveness, coherence and responsibility of EU human rights policy, and must speak and act on behalf of the EU, not simply the Council. The special representative will be the high-level interlocutor for third countries and international organisations.
The committee says that the special representative must work in close cooperation with the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs, the European External Action Service and EU delegations, and also international organisations, NGOs and experts working in the field of human rights.
The committee stated that the EP wants to play its role in the appointment procedure and the monitoring of the representative's two- or two-and-a-half-year term of office. It would like a hearing with the person before he/she is appointed by the Council, and calls for the special representative to provide an annual progress report and a detailed implementation report at the end of his term of office.
The report will be put to the vote in the plenary session in June. The special representative will be appointed at the Foreign Affairs Council of 25 June. (CG/transl.rt)