Protection of national minorities
REPORT
Doc. 7899
8 September 1997
(Rapporteur: Mr Henning Gjellerod, Denmark, Socialist Group)
Summary
The protection of national minorities continues to be a crucial element of peace and security in Europe.
There is no shortage of international legal and political instruments, but there still is insufficient political will to accept and implement these.
Too often, protection of minorities remains an issue of foreign, rather than domestic, policy.
Member states should ratify and implement the Council of Europe's legal instruments: the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.
The European Union should systematically take account of the results of the Council of Europe's monitoring mechanisms when assessing respect for minority rights.
I. Draft recommendation
1. The protection of national minorities continues to be a crucial element of peace and security in Europe.
2. The action taken by international organisations to ensure such protection has been largely complementary. Specific shortcomings are, however, found in each organisation, as well as in the co-ordination of activities between them.
3. The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has adopted important political declarations of intent and has established, as an instrument of conflict prevention, the Office of High Commissioner on National Minorities. However, its standards - set by unanimity -are not legally binding.
4. The Council of Europe, at the Assembly's initiative, has prepared legally binding instruments, notably the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional or Minority languages. Yet, neither instrument has entered into force so far because of an insufficient number of ratifications.
5. Like the Framework Convention, the current intergovernmental Confidence-Building Measures in the minority field are a follow-up to the Council of Europe's 1993 Vienna Summit. So far, only six member states have made voluntary contributions to finance projects.
6. The European Union has made protection of minorities a condition for economic cooperation as well as for membership. The effectiveness of its policy is however seriously hampered by the absence of a permanent monitoring mechanism and lack of clarity with regard to the standards a given country is supposed to respect in this field.
7. Political declarations on the issue have further been adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, the Inter-Parliamentary Union, and the Central European Initiative. The Council of the Baltic Sea States has established the Office of the Commissioner on Human Rights and Minority Questions, with an 'ombudsman'-mandate.
8. Clearly, there is no shortage of international political and legal instruments for the protection of minorities, but there is still insufficient political will to accept and implement these. Protection of minorities all too often remains an issue of foreign, rather than domestic, policy.
9. Therefore, the Assembly recommends that the Committee of Ministers:
II. Explanatory memorandum by the Rapporteur
1. The protection of national minorities continues to be a crucial issue for peace and stability in Europe. It remains an Assembly priority and no less than five texts - Recommendation 1201 (1993), Resolution 1049(1994), Recommendation 1255 (1995), Recommendations 1285 and 1300 (1996) - have been adopted in the last four years.
2. The aim of this report is to draw up a political balance sheet of achievements and setbacks on action taken on the issue by the member States of the Council of Europe in the framework of our Organisation, the OSCE, European Union and other international organisations, with a view to addressing specific proposals to the Committee of Ministers.
3. Such a balance sheet makes it possible to identify some of the difficulties which prevent the full use of the legal, political and other instruments at our disposal. It should also help us to develop a more efficient and co-ordinated action with relevant international organisations in this field.
4. This report is not intended to examine new legal norms and mechanisms which is a task of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights.
5. The Council of Europe has extensive experience in the protection of minority rights, enabling it to create legally binding instruments such as, notably, the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. Its main difficulty is the lack of political will of its member States to ratify and implement these instruments (see Annex A). Only in the case of accession of new member States is there some leverage to impose signature and ratification of existing instruments.
6. The European Union (EU) maintains a comprehensive network of economic relations with European non-member states, a number of which are candidates for membership. All these states are already members of the Council of Europe. The EU attaches considerable importance to respect for human and minority rights. A clause providing for suspension or other measures in the case of violation of those rights is included in all agreements with third countries concluded after 1989 (see Annex B).
7. The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is at the origin of several political declarations of intent dealing with minorities. In the context of crisis and conflict management and prevention, its High Commissioner on National Minorities has been particularly effective.
8. An example of successful regional co-operation is the Commissioner of the Council of the Baltic Sea States on Democratic Institutions and Human Rights including the Rights of persons belonging to Minorities. This and other regional approaches could usefully complement the work of the Council of Europe, either through co-operation with Assembly rapporteurs or through working with the future Advisory Committee under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities.
II. Council of Europe
European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages
9. The first attempt at strengthening the protection of European minorities was the adoption of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. This Charter was adopted by the Committee of Ministers in November 1992 with the aim to protect the languages spoken by these minorities. It encourages States to protect the status of regional and minority languages, but it does not confer any specific rights on those who speak them.
10. The charter entails comprehensive and very specific provisions on the protection of minority languages. States are supposed to provide adequate educational and cultural facilities and unlimited access to the media for minority languages. An expert committee under the auspices of the Committee of Ministers should monitor whether the participating states fulfil the commitments of the Charter, and the participating states are required to report every three years about the fulfilment of the provisions. The states define what languages should be subject to monitoring, and immigrant languages are not included.
11. More than four years after the charter was opened for signature only four countries (Finland, Hungary, the Netherlands and Norway) have completed the ratification procedure. Since five ratifications are required for the charter to enter into force it is not yet legally binding. The drawn out ratification process indicates a lack of political will. Most states seem to fear the financial, technical and other implications of ratifying the charter. However, a harmonious relationship between majorities and minorities offers benefits, in terms of stability and international goodwill, that would outweigh the costs of supporting special arrangements for minority languages. The ratification of the charter by a majority of member states would therefore represent an important step in the right direction.
Assembly Recommendation 1201
12. In February 1993, the Parliamentary Assembly adopted Recommendation 1201, which directly addresses the difficult issue of minority rights. The appendix to this Recommendation contains the Text of the proposal for an additional protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights. Article 1 offers one of the first international attempts at defining the term "national minority":
"National Minorities:
- reside on the territory of that state and are citizens thereof,
- maintain long-standing, firm and lasting ties with that state
- display distinctive ethnic, cultural, religious or linguistic characteristics
- are sufficiently representative, although smaller in number than the rest of the
- population of that state or of a region of that state and
- are motivated by a concern to preserve together that which constitutes their common identity, including their culture, their religion or their language."
13. Although this definition can be interpreted in many different ways, the article is an impartial attempt at providing commonly acceptable criteria for a common European definition of the complex term "minority".
14. Article 11 emphasises the rights of persons belonging to minorities to autonomy within the boundaries of their respective states. The article reads as follows: "In the regions where they are in a majority the persons belonging to a national minority shall have the right to have at their disposal appropriate local or autonomous authorities or to have a special status, matching the specific historical and territorial situation and in accordance with the domestic legislation of the State."
15. This Article provoked some strong reactions. Treaties on good neighbourliness and friendly co-operation between Hungary and Slovakia and Hungary and Romania - concluded in the framework of the Pact on Stability (see chapter III below ) - both refer to Recommendation 1201, but explicitly exclude Article 11, either in the agreement itself or in a declaration when ratifying. Due to these controversies, an interpretation of Article 11 was requested from the Commission for Democracy through Law ("Venice Commission").
16. Nevertheless, the Assembly decided that it would continue to consider the draft protocol in Recommendation 1201 as a reference text and that it would expect member States to base their legislation and policies in respect of minorities on it. Consequently, the respect of the principles of the protocol has been included as a commitment in Assembly opinions on the admission of new member States.
Vienna Summit
17. The Heads of State and Government of the Council of Europe meeting in Vienna in October 1993 instructed the Committee of Ministers "to draft with minimum delay a Framework Convention specifying the principles which contracting States commit themselves to respect" and to "begin work on drafting a protocol complementing the European Convention on Human Rights in the cultural field by provisions guaranteeing individual rights, in particular for persons belonging to national minorities."
18. The fact that the Heads of State emphasised the necessity to protect the rights of persons belonging to national minorities represented a clear progress in the process towards ensuring a higher level of international protection of minorities. The fact remains however, that the decision on the Framework Convention failed short of the level of the protection envisaged in the Recommendation 1201 (1993) and that the work on a protocol complementing the European Convention on Human Rights has been suspended.
Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities
19. The Framework Convention was adopted in 1994, as a direct follow up to the Vienna Summit and as the first legally binding multilateral instrument in its field. It sets out some principles relating to the promotion of the identity of national minorities, which the parties undertake to respect. It does not define the concept of national minority.
20. In its Recommendation 1255 (1995) the Assembly expressed the opinion that the Convention is weekly worded and that it formulates a number of vaguely defined objectives and principles, the observation of which will be an obligation of the contracting party, but not a right which individuals may invoke. In Recommendations 1285 (1996) and 1300 (1996), it made a series of proposals to improve the monitoring procedure by the advisory committee to be set up.
21. The Convention has still not entered into force and several member States even failed to sign it. There are 34 signatures but only nine ratifications of the Convention. Twelve ratifications are needed for the entry into force.
Confidence-building measures
22. Confidence-building measures are yet another follow up to the Vienna Summit. They are intended to provide expert assistance on draft bilateral treaties and national legislation and pilot projects to promote good relations between minorities and the majority of a population in the context of conflict prevention. A number of projects concerned the situation of Roma, which is of particular importance as Roma community does not benefit from the protection on the basis of bilateral treaties in the same way as other minorities.
23. A Steering Group was set up by the Committee of Ministers to examine proposals and select projects. These are financed through the ordinary budget of the Council of Europe and through voluntary contributions. So far only six countries made such voluntary contributions namely: Finland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. The Assembly should recommend to the Committee of Ministers to increase the funds available through the ordinary budget and encourage those countries which have not yet done so to contribute to the voluntary fund.
Joint programme with the EU Commission: accompanying measures Stability Pact
24. Signed on 10 June 1996 to expectedly last 18 months, the initial programme on minorities in Central European countries is carried out jointly with the EU Commission's PHARE Programme. It consists of four main projects:
"Democracy, Human Rights and Minorities" project
25. This project ended in May 1997 after four years. The intersectoral project was run by the Council for Cultural Co-operation and its specialised committees. The aim was to promote principles and practical measures for ensuring cultural diversity and intercultural democracy. The project's conclusion drew up a list of suggestions and guidelines for future action in the fields of media, languages and literature, heritage and especially history, the religious dimension of cultural identity, community's cultural life and development, education for citizenship and human rights.
26. The Final Declaration called upon the forthcoming Second Summit of the Council of Europe Heads of State and Government to "give high priority to cultural co-operation so as to ensure that the intercultural dimension is taken into account in the construction of Europe and in the education and training of its citizens".
III. European Union
The human rights clause in agreements with third countries
27. The EU has been systematically including references to the protection of human rights and democratic principles to its agreements with third countries since the fourth Lom� Convention in 1989. All subsequent agreements contain a clause in the body of the agreement referring to respect for human rights and democratic values as essential elements of the agreement. The clause authorises the suspension or provides for appropriate measures should the parties fail to meet their obligations. The preamble refers to the universal and/or regional instruments. This usually includes the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Helsinki Final Act and the Charter of Paris for a new Europe.
28. The inclusion of a specific reference to the rights of minorities in these clauses and a reference to relevant Council of Europe texts would significantly improve the human rights dimension of the agreements in question. The findings of Council of Europe monitoring procedures should be taken into account by the EU when assessing respect for these clauses.
Conditions for membership
29. The respect for national minorities is also a condition for the accession of new member states. Conclusions of the European Council in Copenhagen in June 1993 stated that membership in the EU requires"...stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities...". In a Resolution on the preparation for accession of East European countries (A4-0101/96) the European Parliament has urged the Council and the Commission "...in their policy towards Central and Eastern Europe, to take full account of the political activities of other international institutions in this field...".
Strategy in relations with countries of south-eastern Europe
30. The Council of Ministers on 29 April 1997 adopted a strategy on the conditionality in relations with the countries of south-eastern Europe, which have not yet concluded a European agreement on associated membership (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Albania). Respect for the right of minorities is an explicit condition for the unilateral commercial preferences, participation in the PHARE programme or conclusion of contractual relations. The strategy refers to "generally accepted norms in the protection of human rights and rights of minorities". Additional elements to be considered in examining the compliance with this norms include:
- the right to create and maintain their own educational, cultural and religious institutions, organisations and associations,
- reasonable possibilities for the minorities to use their own language in courts and with public authorities,
- adequate protection of refugees and displaced persons returning from regions where they constituted an ethnic minority.
31. In spite of these elements the definition of the obligations imposed on countries in question is far too general. A reference to the relevant texts of the Council of Europe, primarily the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional and Minority Languages would make the strategy in this particular aspect more transparent and efficient. This would also open the way for further co-operation, with the Council of Europe - also through its monitoring mechanisms - providing guidelines and recommendations for the implementation of the strategy in the field of human rights and rights of minorities.
The Pact on Stability
32. Following the crisis in former Yugoslavia and in order to prevent an outbreak of ethnic conflicts in other parts of Europe, the then French Prime Minister, Edouard Balladur, launched an initiative in 1993 to establish a "Pact on Stability" with all EU applicant states. Balladur's vision was to strengthen the foreign policy profile of the European Union by ensuring that applicant states solve their historical differences as well as minority problems prior to entering the European Union. Although the original proposal of the French government was changed considerably before being endorsed by the EU in 1994, the main idea remained intact: to contribute to the stability of Europe by preventing, through the conclusion of agreements by the parties concerned, tension and potential conflicts, which would undermine the balance of the continent. The Pact on Stability offers, by its consequent use of both carrot (various EU-support programmes) and stick (states with unsolved bilateral conflicts or grave minority problems should not expect to become members of the EU), the applicant states a clear picture of some of the political expectations of the European Union.
33. The Pact on Stability consists of two parts. The first part is a multilateral "Declaration of Good Neighbourliness", that was signed in March 1995. This declaration is politically binding for all signatories. The document declares that the aim of the pact is to increase co-operation and solidarity in Europe. The obstacles to achieve this are identified as "all manifestations of intolerance, and especially of aggressive nationalism, racism, chauvinism, xenophobia and anti-Semitism, as well as discrimination between persons and persecution on religious or ideological grounds" (art. 4). This declaration was signed by all OSCE participating states as well as by the principal multilateral organisations in Europe.
34. The second part of the Pact consists of more than 100 bilateral treaties between:
35. The task of monitoring the many treaties and mediating in potential conflicts between the parties was handed over to the OSCE in March 1995.
36. Of more than hundred agreements and arrangements included in the Pact, only seven were signed after the start of the negotiation process. It should be acknowledged that the Pact had a positive impact on the negotiation process between Hungary and its two neighbours. A treaty on neighbourly relations was signed in with Slovakia in 1995 and with Romania in 1997. The Pact also helped dialogue between the Baltic states and Russia.
37. The Pact unfortunately failed to provide for an active mechanism of monitoring of compliance. Its impact on the agreements and arrangements that preceded it therefore remains negligible.
IV. OSCE
38. The OSCE has been successful at formulating political declarations that have served as the basis for the work of other organisations. The documents are consensus documents, signed by all states. Unanimous decision-making in an organisation that today encompasses 55 member states - although the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia remains suspended - is however troublesome and requires lengthy negotiations. The complex task of reaching a compromise between the conflicting opinions of all member states often necessitates so many reservations that it considerably weakens the original intentions of the document (as was the case of the mandate establishing the High Commissioner on National Minorities). The member states, in 1992, therefore agreed to strengthen the organisation's ability to respond swiftly to challenges by introducing the "consensus-minus-one" for some decision-making procedures.
The Copenhagen Document
39. Minority rights were placed in the forefront at the summit in Copenhagen in 1990 by the adoption of the so-called Copenhagen Document. The Document commits all member states to recognise the rights of persons belonging to national minorities. It is clearly stated in the Document, that "Persons belonging to national minorities have the right freely to express, preserve and develop their ethnic, cultural, linguistic or religious identity and to maintain and develop their culture in all its aspect, free of any attempts at assimilation against their will". The Copenhagen Document has been a very important reference for the work of other organisations. For the first time since World War II it was recognised that minority rights should be subject to scrutiny by the main international organisations. With this breakthrough the door was opened for addressing minority rights issues also in other fora.
The High Commissioner on National Minorities
40. At the OSCE meeting in Helsinki in July 1992, the Heads of State decided to establish a new tool for conflict prevention - a High Commissioner on National Minorities. The main task of the High Commissioner is to prevent conflicts involving national minorities and provide early warning, that is to identify problems and encourage solutions before they develop into armed conflicts. In January 1993, the former Dutch Foreign Minister, Mr. Max van der Stoel was appointed the first High Commissioner on National Minorities.
41. The High Commissioner can conduct missions in countries, without the consent of the governments, if he receives information indicating the potential for a bilateral conflict. Many states have endorsed his mediation efforts and assisted his fact-finding missions. The High Commissioner has been actively involved as a mediator in Albania, Slovakia, Hungary, Moldova, Estonia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzistan as well as other states. The High Commissioner has not limited himself to defending national minorities. On a number of occasions he has also raised his voice in defence of the rights of minorities that do not have a home state, such as the Roma.
42. However despite this and other limitations of the mandate, the mere fact that an international organisation now specifically deals with the problem of minority rights constitutes an important progress. Failure to comply with the High Commissioner's recommendations would certainly have consequences and could endanger a participating state's integration into other organisations.
Repository for the Pact on Stability
43. The conference on Stability in Europe held in Paris, 20-21 March 1995, adopted a Pact on Stability (see chapter III) comprised of a political declaration and a wide range of bilateral agreements and arrangements with a non-exhaustive list of accompanying measures supported by the EU which was also annexed.
44. The Pact was handed over to the OSCE to follow its implementation. The OSCE serves as a repository, but there are no mechanisms for active monitoring of the compliance with the Pact.
V. Others
United Nations
45. Article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights provides that: "in those States, in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with other members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, or to use their own language". Article 27 served as a base for some concrete decisions on the issue of minorities the Human Rights Committee.
46. The Declaration on Rights of Persons belonging to National, Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities, adopted by the General Assembly in December 1992 lists some rights in favour of persons who are members of ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities. The political obligations of the states are, however, not precise and cautiously drafted.
Inter-Parliamentary Union
47. A resolution, presented by your Rapporteur to the IPU in 1996, on the protection of minorities as a global issue and a prerequisite for stability, security and peace called upon Governments and Parliaments to, inter alia, enhance the legal status of minorities, conclude bilateral and multilateral treaties to implement the rights of minorities, to encourage links between global, transnational and regional organizations with a view to co-ordinating efforts to protect minorities and to ensure the enforcement of measures adopted for the protection of the rights of minorities and to periodically review and analyse them in order to ensure their effectiveness.
48. The resolution also called on minorities and their representatives to: "recognize that just as persons belonging to minorities have rights which require protection, they also have duties and obligations to respect civil order and the rule of law". Furthermore, the resolution called on minorities and their representatives to: "seek peaceful solutions and refrain from using violence in securing their rights".
Council of the Baltic Sea States
49. The members of this Council (Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, Poland, Germany and the EU Commission) agreed to establish the Office of the Commissioner on Human Rights and Minority Questions in March 1993. It has an "ombudsman"-mandate" giving him the possibility to receive individual complaints and publish an overview of action taken. The current Commissioner is a former member of the Parliamentary Assembly, Mr Ole Espersen from Denmark. All states covered by his mandate have established an "Ombudsman" like institution or are expected to do so before the end of 1997. The Commissioner received more than 100 individual complaints, most of which have already been resolved. Many dealt with the problem of citizenship, particularly with regard to Russian speaking population in the Baltic states, with residence permits and with family reunification.
50. According to Mr Espersen, a long term goal should be to establish a network of regional Commissioners, acting in co-operation with the Council of Europe.
Central European Initiative
51. The Central European Initiative was set up in 1989 as an Italian initiative for regional political and economic co-operation. It currently has 16 members: Albania, Austria, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech republic, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Italy, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Ukraine and Hungary.
52. A political declaration on the Protection of Minority Rights was signed in November 1994, by which the states recognised the right of persons belonging to national minorities to exercise fully their rights and fundamental freedoms, individually or jointly with others. The document pays special attention to the question of gypsies. A working group on minorities has also been set up.
VI. Conclusions
53. It is evident that the protection of national minorities is often seen as an issue of foreign rather than of domestic policy. This makes it extremely difficult to ensure the respect for generally accepted standards in the case of unresolved issues between neighbouring states and in generally unstable regions, for example in the Balkans - where an improvement of the situation of minorities would be most urgently needed.
54. The action taken in favour of national minorities by the international organisations is conducted under an informal division of labour, with the OSCE providing political declarations of intent and the Council of Europe drawing up legally binding documents. The European Union, through its economic agreements with third countries, theoretically has effective leverage to ensure implementation of international standards.
55. Shortcomings are found in each of the organisations involved as well as in the co-operation and co-ordination of activities between these organisations.
56. The political texts adopted by the OSCE, as well as the mandate of the High Commissioner on National Minorities are weakened by the fact that they represent the lowest common denominator of positions of more than fifty member states, which are deciding with unanimity.
57. The Council of Europe's record in the protection of human rights, its past work on the protection of minorities as well a lower number of participating countries would argue in favour of more ambitious standards in the protection of national minorities. However, the fact that its standards are to be legally binding, has set serious limits to such ambitions. This has affected the drafting as well as entering into force of the Council of Europe instruments.
58. The European Union, through its economic leverage, clearly has at its disposal an effective means of ensuring implementation of standards for the protection of human rights and rights of minorities. However, the absence of a permanent monitoring mechanism and lack of clarity with regard to the standards a given country is supposed to respect seriously hampers its effectiveness.
59. The problem with the effective protection of the rights of persons belonging to national minorities is not a shortage of international political and legal instruments, but their acceptance and implementation. The Assembly should increase its efforts to ensure that the Council of Europe's legally binding instruments, such as the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages and the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, be ratified and implemented.
60. The Committee of Ministers should continue its work on the protection of minorities through the appropriate expert committees. This should include activities involving governments and civil society aimed at promoting the effective implementation of international standards.
61. It is equally important that regular monitoring be carried out by the Assembly and the Committee of Ministers, in close co-ordination with the European Union. This co-ordination would be most effective if the European Union were to take the results of the monitoring procedures of the Parliamentary Assembly and the Committee of Ministers systematically into account, in particular when assessing the compliance with the human rights/minority rights clauses in its agreements with third countries. The European Union should furthermore make full use of the Council of Europe's expertise when providing assistance to applicant states.
Reporting committee: Political Affairs Committee.
Budgetary implications for the Assembly: none
Draft recommendation unanimously adopted by the committee with 3 abstentions on 1 September 1997.
Members of the committee: Mr B�rsony (Chairman), Sir Anthony Durant (Vice-Chairman) (Alternate Mr Atkinson), Mr van der Linden (Vice-Chairman), Mrs Ojuland (Vice-Chairperson), MM Aloglu (Alternate: Mr Kiratlioglu), Antretter, Bakke, Baumel, Mrs Belohorska, MM Belyaev, Bergqvist, Bernardini, Bj�rck, Bloetzer, Bokov, Cem, Chircop (Alternate Mr. de Marco), Chornovil, Deasy, Diacov, Domljan, Evangelisti, Galanos, Gjellerod, Hardy, Hornhues (Alternate: Mr B�hler), Irmer, Iwinski, Kalus, Mrs Kautto, MM Kirilov, Kuzmickas, Mrs Lentz-Cornette, MM Lopez Henares (Alternate: Mr Puche),Lupu (Alternate: Mr Kelemen), van der Maelen, Maginas, Mart�nez, Medeiros Ferreira, Meier, Melescanu, Mota Amaral, M�hlemann, Musto, Oliynik, Pahor, Palmitjavilo Ribo, Popovski, Prusak, Mrs Ragnarsdottir, MM Risari (Alternate Mr Diana), Schieder, Schwimmer, Selva, Sinka, Sir Dudley Smith, Mr Spahia (Mrs Karamitro), Mrs Stepova, Mrs Suchocka, MM Toshev, Urbain (Alternate: Mr Staes), Vrettos, Woltjer, Ziuganov.
N.B. The names of those members who took part in the meeting are printed in italics.
Secretaries of the committee : Mr Kleijssen, Mr Gruden.