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Council of Europe: Germany Presidency

01 November 1997

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At the start of the German Presidency of the Council of Europe in November, the German Interior Minister Kanther (CDU) announced that the government would not sign the Convention on facilitated naturalisation of foreigners. The head of the German delegation Schäfer (Liberal Party) remarked that this refusal was not definite and intimated that the pressure on German domestic politics and the coalition partner CDU suits him. The main task of the German Presidency will be the implementation of the October summit conclusion to promote human rights and democracy - a political minefield in particular in eastern Europe. The appointment of an Ombudsman for human rights and the establishment of a new permanent human rights court for citizens' complaints are uncontroversial. The 40 judges of the human rights court start working in November 1998. A different issue is the "adherence to obligations entered by member states". The German Foreign Minister Kinkel intends to use the Presidency to expand the democracy programmes for the new east European member states and has mentioned necessary control mechanisms. This diplomatic formulation hides a tricky problem. Earlier in the autumn, the Austrian Vice-General Secretary Leuprecht had to resign after he had criticised the Committee of Ministers for being too lenient towards democracy deficits and human rights violations in eastern Europe. Among the controversial issues are censorship, suppression of opposition and national minorities in Croatia and Slovakia, the situation in Russian prisons, torture in Turkey, and the abolition of the death penalty.

die tageszeitung, 13.10.97; Frankfurter Rundschau, 10.11.97.

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