Human Rights of conscripts

Doc. 9764

1 April 2003

Human Rights of conscripts

Written Question No. 424 to the Chairperson of the Committee of Ministers

Reply from the Chairperson of the Committee of Ministers

adopted at the 833^rd meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies (26 March 2003)

I. Written Question No. 424 by Mr Jurgens (Doc. 9702)

Considering that on 22 September 1998 the Assembly took a decision on Recommendation 1380 (1998) concerning the “Human Rights of Conscripts”;

Taking it into account that it took the Committee of Ministers all of fourteen months to reply (22 November 1999);

Taking note of the fact that in the reply the Committee of Ministers stated that it had “transmitted the text of the Recommendation and the Resolution to the Steering Committee on Human Rights (CDDH) so that it may examine…/…whether it is necessary to draw up supplementary guidelines”; And that “the Committee of Ministers will keep the Assembly informed of any proposal for action which may be taken”,

To ask the Committee of Ministers

Why the matter seems not to have been transmitted to the CDDH (at least no record exists of such a transmission) and when it intends to do so.

II. Reply by the Chairperson of the Committee of Ministers

1. The Chairman of the Committee of Ministers has studied Written Question No. 424, which calls for the following observations on his part:

2. First, as the questioner is aware, it was in 1999 that steps were taken by the Committee of Ministers to ensure more prompt replies to Recommendations addressed to it by the Parliamentary Assembly. Secondly, in the case to which the questioner refers, the act of transmission is implicit in the adoption of the reply itself. No separate decision to transmit the text to the CDDH was considered necessary.

3. Thirdly, the Chairman recalls that in its reply, the Committee expressed its confidence that “the European Convention on Human Rights and the case-law of its control machinery already provide guidelines concerning the protection of the human rights of conscripts”. It deduces from the absence of any corresponding initiative by the CDDH that it considers that further action in this respect is of a lesser degree of priority than the tasks with which it is currently charged.