Newsletter of the Venice Commission
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4 / 2014

December 2014 plenary session

 Decisions of the December plenary

At its 101th session in Venice 12-13 December 2014 the Commission: 

-         adopted the opinions on:

• the Law on non-governmental organisations (Public Associations and Funds), as amended, of Azerbaijan;
  
• the Draft law on the rights and duties of judges and the Judicial Council of Montenegro and on the Draft law on Courts of Montenegro;
  

-         adopted interim opinions on:

• the Draft law on the State Prosecutor's Office of Montenegro and

• on the Draft law on the Special Prosecutor's Office of Montenegro, and, in the light of the urgency of the domestic proceedings, authorised the rapporteurs to send the final opinions to the parliament of Montenegro prior to the March Plenary Session;

• the Law on Government Cleansing ("Lustration Law") of Ukraine and agreed to continue co-operation with Ukraine with a view to the revision of this Law;

-        adopted the joint Venice Commission and the OSCE/ODIHR Guidelines on Freedom of Association ;

-         adopted the Amicus curiae briefs:

• for the Constitutional Court of Georgia on the question of the defamation of the deceased;

• for the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Moldova on certain provisions of the Law on professional integrity testing (anti-corruption law) concerning, in particular, Constitutional court and ordinary court judges;

·        was informed on follow-up to:

• the Amicus curiae brief on the Immunity of Judges for the Constitutional Court of Moldova;

• the Joint Opinion on the Draft Law on the Public Prosecutor's Office of Ukraine;  

• the Opinion on the Draft Law on making changes and additions to the Civil Code (introducing compensation for non-pecuniary damage) of the Republic of Armenia and

• the opinion on the Draft Concept Paper on the Constitutional Reforms of the Republic of Armenia;

-        held an exchange of views inter alia with :

• Mr Pavlo Petrenko, Minister of Justice of Ukraine, and with Messrs Leonid Yemets and Yegor Soboliev, Members of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine;

• Mr Geoffrey Vos, President elect of the European Network of Councils for the Judiciary, on future co-operation;

 ...

Selected opinions

SELECTED EVENTS

21/10/2014

Visit of the Inter-American Court on Human Rights

Strasbourg - The Inter-American Court of Human Rights judges visited the Council of Europe and met a delegation of the Venice Commission, led by its President, Mr Gianni Buquicchio. The main objective of this meeting was to explore possible ways of cooperation between the Inter-American Court and the Venice Commission. Six out of the seven judges of the Inter-American Court, including its President, Mr Humberto Sierra, as well as its Registrar, Mr Pablo Saavedra, came to Strasbourg on this occasion.

Selected activities since the 100th plenary session

• Democratic Institutions and Fundamental Rights

Armenia – international conference on constitutional processes in post-communist countries - 03 - 04/11/2014

Belgrade – following the requests for the Venice Commission’s opinion on the draft amendments and additions to the Law on the High Judicial Council and on the Law on the State Prosecutorial Council of the Republic of Serbia, a delegation of the Commission plans to meet with the authorities in order to discuss the draft amendments.  

• Constitutional Justice

Montenegro - Constitutional Court - 27 - 28/11/2014

Budva – The Venice Commission participated in the Conference on "Constitutional protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms". One of the rapporteurs, Ms Wedam Lukic presented the Opinion on the Draft Law on the Constitutional Court of Montenegro, adopted by the Venice Commission at its 100th Plenary Session in October 2014).
Opinion 

• Elections and Political Parties

Tunis - presidential elections - legal assistance to PACE  - 20 - 24/11/2014

Tunisia - At the request of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), the Venice Commission ensures legal assistance to the Election Observation Mission of the Assembly in the context of the presidential elections of 23 November 2014.

Website of the Tunisian Electoral Body
Press release of the PACE

• Neighbourhood Cooperation

Uzbekistan – Conference on application of ICT in courts -20/11/2014

Tashkent - A conference on the use of information and communication technologies in courts was organised jointly by the Supreme Court of Uzbekistan, High Commercial court of Uzbekistan and the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe.

This activity brought together representatives of national institutions as well as participants from the Korea, Malta, Slovenia and Bulgaria.

• Link to the calendar of recent and current events