European Union
PREFACE
Year by year, the European Union is developing and strengthening its actions to promote, and ensure respect for, human rights throughout the world. This 10th EU Annual Report on Human Rights testifies to that constant commitment. Promotion of human rights is now one of the most highly-developed facets of the European Union’s external relations.
The main aim of this report is to inform the widest possible audience, both in Europe and beyond the frontiers of the Union, of the EU’s actions to promote human rights worldwide.
This report covers the period from July 2007 to June 2008. During these twelve months, real progress on human rights has been achieved.
The completion of the reform of the Human Rights Council and the adoption of its operating procedures should enable that central UN body to devote itself now to substantive issues. It is a unique forum bringing together representatives of States, experts and members of civil society. The European Union is fully committed to making its voice heard within the Council and to working to make it function effectively. The Human Rights Council has made a solid start, but all actors, and primarily member states of the Council should work together in good faith so that this new institution is able to fulfil its mandate and to live up to people’s expectations. The first half of 2008 was marked by the first sessions of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), an innovative Human Rights Council mechanism for reviewing the human rights situation in every country in the world, which requires all States to make substantive commitments to improving their protection of human rights.
The death penalty is in retreat. Rwanda and Uzbekistan have abolished capital punishment, taking the number of States which have done so to 135. In the United States, the State of New Jersey was the first US State since 1965 to declare the death penalty illegal. The European Union remains committed on this front. It welcomes the adoption by 104 countries of a resolution by the 62 nd General Assembly of the United Nations calling for a moratorium on the death penalty with a view to the abolition of capital punishment.
In international justice, progress is being made. The arrests of Jean-Pierre Bemba and Radovan Karadžić and the indictment by the International Criminal Court of Thomas Lubanga, Germain Katanga and Mathieu Ngudjolo, former warlords in the Democratic Republic of the Congo accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, represent a significant advance towards ending impunity for massive human rights violations. The European Union supports the action of the International Criminal Court.
The EU’s action in the field of human rights is steadily being reinforced. On the basis of its Guidelines, it intervenes, wherever possible, through diplomatic démarches or declarations, when a person is condemned to death, tortured, imprisoned for his or her opinions or convictions, or threatened. The EU pays particular attention to promoting the rights of the child and will shortly extend the range of its action to include the situation of female victims of violence.
The EU promotes human rights when participating in crisis management. It takes them actively into account when planning, conducting and evaluating ESDP operations. Some of these missions include experts with responsibility for women’s rights or for the situation of children affected by armed conflict.
As well as intervening, where necessary, as a matter of urgency to prevent human rights violations, the European Union intends to give priority to dialogue and cooperation. It seeks to maintain close collaboration with civil society organisations. The EU is currently engaged in more than thirty dialogues and consultations on human rights with third countries in five continents, and they are rapidly growing in number, evidence of the ever-increasing importance which attaches to human rights in international relations. In addition to the cooperation programmes run by Member States, the Commission has reinforced its European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights, which now has an annual budget of nearly EUR 140 million.
The fight for human rights is a long-term one. In many regions of the world, the situation continues to give cause for concern: in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where mass sexual violence is used as a weapon of war, in Darfur where the international community is still endeavouring to put an end to the acts of brutality being inflicted on the civilian population, in Myanmar which was the scene of brutal repression in September 2007 and where the authorities failed to respond adequately to the humanitarian catastrophe caused by Cyclone Nargis. In Sri Lanka, the civilian population is the main victim of the clashes between the authorities and separatist movements. In North Korea and other countries, authoritarian and repressive regimes are holding on to power with no regard for human rights.
In this year of the 60 th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the 15th anniversary of the Vienna Declaration and the 10 th anniversary of the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, it is important for us to remember that human rights are universal and cannot depend on the internal affairs of any State, in Europe or elsewhere. All civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights are indivisible, interdependent and mutually reinforcing.
To be more effective, the European Union must further strengthen its unity of action. We hope that this report, as well as being a source of information, will assist reflection on how, together, we can further increase the coherence of our action and thus enhance its efficacy.
Bernard Kouchner
Minister for Foreign Affairs of France
President of the Council of the European Union
Javier Solana
High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy
Secretary-General of the Council of the European Union
Benita Ferrero-Waldner
Member of the European Commission responsible for External Relations and European
Neighbourhood Policy
