ABSTRACT
The first reference to a Charter of Human Rights in Europe was made in May 1948, at the Congress of Europe held at the Hague, which linked the production of a Charter with progress on European integration. In 1949, the Council of Europe was established to secure inter-governmental and inter-parliamentary co-operation. The objects of the organisation were set out in the Statute. Article 1 provided that the Council should seek to achieve a ‘greater unity between its Members for the purposes of safeguarding and realising the ideals and principles which are their common heritage and facilitating their economic and social progress’. Article 3 of the Statute provided that respect for human rights and the rule of law was to be a condition of membership. The Council of Europe operated with two principal organs namely a Committee of Ministers and a Consultative Assembly. In September 1949, the Legal and Administrative Committee of the Assembly proposed that certain rights drawn from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) should be set out in a detailed document which should be respected by member states of the Council of Europe. The matter was then passed to the Committee of Ministers who, working through two committees in the early months of 1950, produced a draft Convention. This Convention, known as the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, was signed by Foreign Ministers in Rome on 4 November 1950 and entered into force following 10 ratifications on 3 September 1953. Since that date, there has been a steady increase in the number of state parties.2 The general objective of the Convention was to provide for the enforcement at the regional level of rights set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This is made clear when one looks at the Preamble to the European Convention which records states parties as ‘being resolved, as governments of European countries which are likeminded and have a common heritage of political traditions, ideals, freedom and the rule of law to take the first steps for the collective enforcement of certain of the rights stated in the Universal Declaration’.
