The Justice ministers of the European Union Member States will meet in Luxembourg on Friday 11 October for a Justice Council to discuss the fight against racism, measures to combat drug trafficking and the repression of war crimes in Ukraine.
Fighting racism. This meeting will provide an opportunity to review the implementation of the EU anti-racism action plan, adopted in 2020 (https://aeur.eu/f/dsy ). This plan, the first of its kind, aims to step up the fight against racism in all its forms across various areas such as education, employment, housing and health.
At this Council meeting, the Justice ministers, informed by a presentation made by the Director of the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights, Sirpa Rautio, will discuss the progress made to date.
They will also discuss the European Commission’s report published on 25 September (see EUROPE 13490/16), which evaluates actions taken at European and national level. The report comes as European leaders at the December 2023 European Council (https://aeur.eu/f/dsk ) expressed concern at the upsurge in incidents of racism, Islamophobia and antisemitism.
Drug trafficking and organised crime. In addition, the Presidency will inform ministers of ongoing efforts to combat drug trafficking and organised crime within the EU. Recent initiatives to strengthen cooperation between Member States will be discussed. The Council also stresses the importance of improving prevention, investigation and repression strategies, particularly in the face of increasingly protected transnational criminal networks.
Russian aggression against Ukraine. The ministers will also assess actions taken to combat impunity for war crimes committed in the context of Russian aggression.
EU initiatives to ensure that the perpetrators of war crimes do not go unpunished include sending forensic experts to Ukraine, creating a joint investigation team and Eurojust establishing a database of evidence of international crimes, used in particular in the work done by the ‘International Centre for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine’ (see EUROPE 13214/10).
The Council will also discuss Ukraine’s recent accession to the Rome Statute, which will enable greater cooperation with the International Criminal Court.
The luncheon will focus on access to justice from the point of view of the Rule of law and competitiveness. The aim is to reconcile the protection of fundamental rights with the need to maintain a favourable environment for economic development and investment attractiveness.
Alongside these main discussions, the Presidency and the European Commission will provide updates on developments in the fight against antisemitism. The ministers will also be briefed on the upcoming EU-Western Balkans Ministerial Forum on Justice and Home Affairs, scheduled for 28 and 29 October in Montenegro.
Finally, the Commission will present the 2024 annual report on the application of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and take stock of the negotiations on an EU-US agreement on electronic evidence. (Original version in French by Nithya Paquiry)