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Head of CoE Office in Azerbaijan: Council of Europe considers Azerbaijan as a very important member of the organizationâ€“ INTERVIEW

Head of CoE Office in Azerbaijan: Council of Europe considers Azerbaijan as a very important member of the organizationâ€“ <font color=red> INTERVIEW </font>

20 May 2011 10:11 (UTC +04:00)

-How do you estimate the activity of Azerbaijan in Council of Europe?

-The Council of Europe considers the Republic of Azerbaijan as a very important member of the Organization. Since its accession 10 years ago Azerbaijan became a full contracting party to 55 CoE Conventions and a member to 8 Partial Agreements. Furthermore the authorities of the Republic have been active in organizing Conferences of Specialized Ministers of the Council of Europe like the 7th Conference of Ministers of Equality between Men and Women which took place in Baku on May 24-25 last year.
Also I would like to mention the role that Azerbaijan has assigned to itself as a major actor in the CoEâ€™s growing work on intercultural dialogue and its religious dimension. In this connection I would like to recall that Azerbaijan hosted on April 7 and 8 the World Forum on Intercultural Dialogue.

-What kind of projects (in what spheres) does Council of Europe recently implement in Azerbaijan?

-The Council of Europe has always made clear its willingness to co-operate with the authorities in order to help them bring both the legislation and the administrative and judicial practices in protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms to the level expected from a member State of the organization. We are in close contact with the competent authorities in exploring the fields where new projects can be elaborated.

-PACE special reporter on political prisoners Mr. Christophe StrÃ¤sser since his appointment could not visit Azerbaijan to prepare a report. What can you say about it?

-This is an issue that should be settled between the Parliamentary Assembly and the Azerbaijani authorities.

-How do you estimate the implementation of European Court of Human Rights decisions by Azerbaijan?

-Azerbaijan is a party to the European Convention of Human Rights. As such it undertook the obligation to execute the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights which are binding for the member States. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe is monitoring the execution of the judgments and it will examine again the implementation by the Azerbaijani authorities of the rulings of the Court.

-Are any CE officials planning to visit Azerbaijan in near future?

-There is always the possibility for organizing high level visits, but for the time being I can not say anything concrete.