Having reached the end of her six-year term as the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatović presented her final annual report to the Parliamentary Assembly at its winter plenary session in Strasbourg on Monday 21 January.
Between January 2018 (the date of her election) and January 2024, “democracy and human rights have been put under enormous stress”, she stressed, adding that, “to regain lost ground and advance the cause of human rights, we must address the situation with determination and collective effort”.
Among the “enormous” challenges, she cited the following: - disinformation and surveillance, which were already “significant” at the start of her mandate, but have been amplified by the rapid development of digital technologies; - the impact on the rule of law of emergency measures linked to the Covid-19 pandemic; - the increasingly clear connection with human rights of issues such as climate change, social justice and economic inequality.
In her 2023 report, the Commissioner places particular emphasis on the human rights situation in the conflict zones of Ukraine, which she visited again in March, and Nagorno-Karabakh, which she visited in October (see EUROPE 13263/4).
She reiterated her call for “sustained international support” for Ukrainian and Russian civil society organisations and individual initiatives to facilitate the return of Ukrainian children. She also highlighted the situation for the Crimean Tatars.
With regard to Nagorno-Karabakh, the Commissioner urged the Azerbaijani and Armenian authorities to “emphasise the protection of human rights in their peace talks”.
In an “increasingly intricate and demanding human rights landscape”, Ms Mijatović also sees “sources of hope”. Namely the Reykjavik Summit where the Heads of State and Government of the Council of Europe Member States reaffirmed their commitment to the organisation’s values, the collective response to the war in Ukraine and the commitment of NGOs, journalists, rights defenders, national institutions and activists to fight for human rights (see EUROPE 13184/2).
Link to the report: https://aeur.eu/f/aj2 (Original version in French by Véronique Leblanc)