Brussels, 07/06/2002 (Agence Europe) - The Spanish Presidency and the Council of Europe organised a conference in Santiago de Compostela on 3 and 4 June on the contribution of the pan-European organisation, which has 44 members, to the EU's acquis, with, notably, the participation of the Council of Europe's Director General for legal affairs, Guy De Vel, Judge Marc Fischbach and Judge Allen Rosas for the Court of Justice.
In their conclusions, the 80 participants plead in favour of generally enhanced co-operation between the Council of Europe and the EU and call on them: (1) to use all possible synergies, to enhance the complementarity their activities and avoid duplication of work; (2) join forces in order to prepare accession of new Member states to the EU, notably through the realisation of joint programmes. They call on the European Community also to participate as actively as possible0 in the work of the Council of Europe, both within the Committee of Ministers and its subsidiary bodies, and with the committees of government experts. They urge the Fifteen not only to conserve Article 303 of the EC Treaty, which stipulates that "Community shall with the Council of Europe establish all useful co-operation", but by extending the field of application to all issues under EU responsibility, notably those of the second and third pillars. The conclusions also broach:
Consistency and effectiveness in judicial co-operation in criminal matters all over Europe: the participants call on the Council and Europe and the EU to: improve the knowledge and access of all existing European instruments relevant for the fight against crime; - to strengthen their existing arsenal of counter-terrorist measures, while fully respecting human rights and the rule of law; - to improve the protection of victims within the criminal justice system; - to improve the training of national judges, prosecutors and investigators in all questions relating to judicial co-operation in criminal matters and to promote such training in candidate countries for EU membership; - to establish contacts between Eurojust an the Council of Europe with a view to exploring the possibility of concluding a co-operation agreement, as provided for in Article 27 (3) of Eurojust's constituent text.
Coherence in the protection of fundamental rights and freedoms all over Europe: the participants consider that possible integration of the Charter of Fundamental Rights into the EU Treaties and accession of the EC/EU to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and its Protocols are fully complementary steps, and invite the European Convention to take into account the forthcoming report by the Steering Committee for Human Rights of the Council of Europe on the legal and technical issues of a possible accession by the EC/EU to the ECHR.