Amnesty International has today welcomed calls to the UK government from the Council of Europe Commissioner on Human Rights, Dunja Mijatovic to withdraw its widely opposed Northern Ireland Troubles Bill and ensure victims’ rights and needs are at centre of the legacy process.

Ahead of a court hearing on Monday in Istočno Sarajevo, Amnesty International urges BUK, a  hydropower company owned by Belgian-based Green Invest to drop their defamation suits against two local activists who publicly expressed concerns about the potential environmental impact of the company’s small hydropower plants on the Kasindolska river.

Amid rising Islamophobia in Europe, amplified by politicians using anti-Muslim rhetoric, parliamentarians from 46 countries will vote in a plenary session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on a resolution that accuses authorities in several European states of normalizing discrimination against Muslims and calls for state action to address Islamophobia as a form of racism.

Muslim communities in Europe are estimated to account for approximately 25.8 million people or roughly 4.9% of the region’s total population. Amnesty International has long been concerned about racial and religious discrimination and its specific impact on Muslim people’s human rights across Europe.

Letter ahead of the EU General Affairs Council’s meeting on 23 May 2022, on the situation of the rule of law and other Article 2 TEU values in Hungary.

Reacting to the Russian government’s decision to withdraw from the Council of Europe, and its declared intention to denounce the European Convention on Human Rights, Marie Struthers, Amnesty International’s Director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, said:“Russia’s withdrawal from the Council of Europe comes on the heels of its act of aggression against Ukraine, where its troops have committed possible war crimes and serious human rights violations. Though it came ahead of a vote by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe leading to its departure, Russia’s preemptive decision to leave Europe’s principal guardian of human rights and the rule of law and denounce the European Convention on Human Rights is a tragedy for the victims of the Kremlin’s human rights abuses.

Responding to reports regarding today’s decision by the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers to refer Turkey to the European Court of Human Rights for failing to release human rights defender Osman Kavala, Amnesty International’s Europe Director Nils Muižnieks said:

Croatian authorities have consistently assaulted refugees and migrants and denied them access to asylum, in contravention of European and International law, said Amnesty International, in response to a damning report released by the Council of Europe’s Committee on Prevention of Torture (CPT) today.

Responding to the decision by a majority vote of the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers to begin the formal process of infringement against Turkey for failing to release human rights defender, Osman Kavala, Amnesty International’s Europe Director Nils Muižnieks said:

At its London headquarters, Amnesty International has a large sign emblazoned in a hallway encouraging you to “Take Injustice Personally”. For activists, this means not becoming hardened or cynical, but allowing the suffering of others to touch us personally. It is this personal sense of injustice that should motivate us to speak out on behalf of people whose human rights are violated the world over.

Amnesty International’s letter addressing the Permanent Representations to the Council of Europe asking for their support to the initiation of infringement proceedings under article 46 § 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) in the case of Kavala v. Turkey at the forthcoming 1419th DH meeting of the Committee of Ministers on execution of judgments to be held from 30 November to 2 December

Amnesty International Hungary and the Hungarian Helsinki Committee hereby respectfully submittheir joint observations and recommendations under Rule 9(2) of the “Rules of the Committee ofMinisters for the supervision of the execution of judgments and of the terms of friendly settlements”regarding the execution of the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in the Baka v.Hungary case (Application no. 20261/12, Judgment of 23 June 2016), in advance of the 1411th meeting(September 2021) (DH) of the Ministers’ Deputies on the execution of judgments.