Council of Europe

The areas of cooperation of the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health in the Council of Europe (CoE) include:

• Roma issues
• the rights of persons with disabilities
• children’s rights
• drug policy
• bioethics
• quality of medicines
• gender equality
• organ and tissue transplantation and blood donation
• activities of the executive and judicial bodies of the Council of Europe relevant to the administrative branch of the Ministry.

The Council of Europe has issued more than 200 binding conventions and hundreds of non-binding recommendations. Monitoring mechanisms have been created for most conventions. The Ministry of Social Affairs and Health participates in the preparation of international conventions belonging to its administrative branch and is responsible for the implementation of those conventions. The Ministry of Social Affairs and Health reports regularly on the implementation of conventions. These reports are forwarded to the CoE by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.

The binding CoE conventions that have the most relevance to the administrative branch of the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health include the European Convention on Human Rights, the Revised European Social Charter, the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence (Istanbul Convention), the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and the Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine.

There are also other conventions that contain provisions relevant to the Ministry’s administrative branch. These include the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings, and the Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse (Lanzarote Convention).