Brussels, 08/11/2012 (Agence Europe) - The presidents of the European Parliament, Martin Schulz, and of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Jean Claude Mignon - both of whom were elected in January - decided on Wednesday 7 January to bring their two institutions closer together. “We have decided to strengthen our ties and the coordination between the two assemblies, and to complement each other”, Mignon told EUROPE, as until now the relationship has been “rather formal - courteous but not terribly effective”. “We want to communicate together in order to avoid any discordance or dissonance on human rights, fundamental rights and the rule of law”, he said.
“We don't do the same job. The EU is an institution with an extremely great political weight (…) Our mission is rather parliamentary diplomacy”, Mignon continued, highlighting the interest of “showing that all that is complementary. We are not competing against each other. It's not about competition.”
Mignon would also like the Council of Europe to share its know-how. “The EU could benefit from the work that the Parliamentary Assembly does. We need to see how to rationalise our work on well-defined subjects”, he said. Mignon wants the equivalent committees in the two institutions to move closer together and regrets that the European Parliament's rapporteurs do not move closer to, or work with, their counterparts at the Council of Europe, when they are working on a country which is not a member of the EU but is a member of the Council of Europe.
Moving forward together on the frozen conflicts and the Arab Spring. The Parliamentary Assembly thus wants to move forward with the EU on subjects such as the frozen conflicts (Nagorno-Karabakh between Azerbaijan and Armenia, the Cyprus/Turkey and Georgia/Russia conflicts and Transnistria) and the Arab Spring. He also recalled that his Assembly “practises the neighbourhood policy every day” because the neighbourhood countries are members of the Council of Europe, and the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly can help European Commissioner for Enlargement Stefan Füle in his work - a commissioner whom Mignon met on 8 November.
Accession of the EU to the Convention. Mignon also wants the EU's accession to the European Convention on Human Rights before 2014. “Not all the member countries agree to the EU joining this convention, but the obstacles should be removed and a working group has been tackling this task since 2010. I think that the objective would be to get this settled before the next European elections in 2014”, he said (our translation throughout). (CG/transl.fl)