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World Conference on
Constitutional
Justice
The
Venice Commission will organise, in
co-operation with the Constitutional Court of
South Africa, the first World Conference on
Constitutional Justice to be held from 23 to
24
January 2009.
The topic of the Conference will be "Influential
Constitutional Justice - its influence on
society and on developing a global jurisprudence
on human rights".
This Conference will bring
together for the first time in a single event
constitutional courts and equivalent bodies from
throughout the world.
Constitutional Justice has become a
world-wide success. More and
more countries have introduced some form of
constitutional review, either through
specialised constitutional courts or councils or
by attributing powers of constitutional review
to supreme courts or specialised chambers within
them.
The
Constitutional Court of South Africa and the
Venice Commission hope that this Conference will
promote co-operation between courts engaged in
constitutional review and further the
development of global human rights principles to
the benefit of the people of the
world. |
| Constitutional
co-operation |
Study on the Democratic Control of
the Armed
Forces
At its
74th Plenary Session, the Venice
Commission adopted a study on the democratic control of
the armed forces.
This study was carried out at the
request of the Committee of
Ministers.
The report firstly explains that
armies cannot escape the ever increasing
requirement to see State institutions reply to
their actions, and then goes on to show how much
the role of the armed forces has evolved both at
the domestic and international
level.
This study describes specifically
all the institutions involved in the control of
armed forces' activities and shows the different
types of legal tools which exist at the domestic
level in Council of Europe member
States.
At the international level, the
study describes the types of control which exist
today in different international structures such
as the United Nations, the European Union, NATO,
the OSCE, and the Council of Europe. The
legal competence of international jurisdictions
such as the International Court of Justice, the
International Criminal Court and the European
Court of Human Rights is also studied in great
detail. |
| Elections and
referendums |
Armenia -
Pre-electoral
Assistance
With
a view to the Presidential elections on
19
February 2008,
the Venice Commission organised seminars aimed
at staff of the Central Electoral Commission and
representatives of NGOs on the different stages
of the electoral process and difficulties
encountered. A
Conference on free and fair elections, was also
organised for, in particular, judges on
electoral disputes, in co-operation with the
Constitutional Court of Armenia, the
ArmenianLegalSchool
and the American Bar
Association.
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Evaluation
of the Constitution of Finland
The
Finish authorities asked the Venice Commission
to take part in the evaluation of Finland's
Constitution, adopted in 1999. This is
a very important initiative occuring during a
period of non-crisis.
Within this framework, the Venice
Commission adopted an
opinion on the Constitution of Finland at
its March 2008 session. The
Commission emphasised that on the whole the
Constitution is in conformity with European
standards in particular of democracy, the rule
of law and human rights.
Nonetheless, some adjustments should be
envisaged, in particular in the wording of some
provisions relating to human rights. The
preeminence of international law, recognised in
practice, should be recognised de
jure.
The creation of a specialised
constitutional court is not essential, however
it would be preferable to extend the judicial
control of constitutionality beyond the cases of
evident conflict with the Constitution.
Finally, institutionalisation of,
already existing, mechanisms such as
co-operation between the Prime Minister
(responsible for European affairs) and the
President (responsible for international
affairs) could be
considered. | |
