A regional parliamentary conference held on 6 November 2018 in Dubrovnik, Croatia, gathered parliamentarians from the MENA region together with parliamentarians from Council of Europe member States, as well as Council of Europe and Croatian top-ranking officials and experts. It was organised by the Political Affairs Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), in co-operation with PACE’s Parliamentary Project Support Division, in the framework of the Croatian Chairmanship of the Council of Europe.
The Conference was opened with PACE’s President Liliane Maury Pasquier‘s speech, in which she evoked the principles of “democracy, human dignity and fundamental rights, as well as the rule of law” to which both Europe and the Mediterranean region aspire. She also presented the Assembly’s “Partnership for democracy” status, that allows sharing experience and good practice between Council of Europe member and non-member States and which is currently held by the parliaments of Morocco, Jordan and Kyrgyz Republic, as well as the Palestinian National Council*.
The Deputy Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Gabriella Battaini-Dragoni, also underlined that the current cross-border challenges faced by both Mediterranean shores can be faced jointly. She recalled that to that end, the Council of Europe has provided in the past, and still provides opportunities and tools for cooperation. For example joint programmes financed by the European Union and the Council of Europe such as the South Programme, as well as bilateral partnerships with Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia, which have shown concrete results.
In the spirit of this discourse, the conference was an opportunity for representatives of the MENA region to contribute in discussions during working sessions tackling various topics such as the challenges to the stability of the Mediterranean region, strengthening democratic institutions through constitutional and legal reforms, or the concept of democratic security and the Council of Europe’s contribution in the process. |
