WRITTEN QUESTION E-0121/98 by Gerardo Fernández-Albor (PPE) to the Commission (30 January 1998)

Subject: Commemoration by the Commission of the European Union of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

The various signatory states plan to establish national committees to organize commemorative events to celebrate the forthcoming fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In view the Union's constant efforts to defend human rights in a world where human rights are continuously violated and infringed, it is particularly important that the Commission, as an institution representing the European Union as a whole, should celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration in a distinctive and unique manner.

Can the Commission say how it intends to commemorate the fiftieth Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in what way it shall be different to the various national committees?

Answer given by Mr Van den Broek on behalf of the Commission (18 February 1998)

Last year the Commission approved two schemes to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. They are a master's degree in human rights and democratisation and an EU human rights agenda for the new millennium.

The European master's degree course got under way in October. The intake for the 1997/98 academic year comprised 53 students from eleven Member States and six students from Central and Eastern Europe. Teaching is being provided by 44 professors and lecturers and 13 assistant lecturers at ten universities (Padua, Deusto-Bilbao, Strasbourg III, Bochum, Essex, Maastricht, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Abo-Turku, Coimbra and Dublin). The first degrees will be awarded in Venice at a ceremony timed to coincide with other fiftieth anniversary celebrations.

A research and study programme run by the European Institute in Florence will produce a human rights agenda for the new millennium. The recommendations will be submitted to the Member States' governments in November. The text will be the fruit of discussions guided by a committee of human rights figures. Rapporteurs from the fifteen Member States and a member of Parliament will be invited to make proposals in three subject areas: human rights in the Community, human rights outside the Community and the institutional aspects of protecting human rights. These proposals will be presented to academic circles, the non-governmental sector and regional and international organisations at two conferences in May and June. The committee will then approve the human rights agenda for official unveiling at December's closing conference in Vienna.

In a declaration marking the start of the year of the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted in Luxembourg on 12 and 13 December, the European Council welcomed the implementation of academic programmes by the European Commission for the fiftieth anniversary and said that the Member States would be launching national initiatives to commemorate that anniversary.

The Commission will consider the possibility of other commemorative schemes, in line with the wishes expressed by Parliament in its commentary on the 1998 budget.