Monitoring Committee

Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ has accused the Venice Commission of being a "mouthpiece of Turkey's opposition," criticizing the timing and wording of its new report on the government-supported constitutional amendment to shift Turkey to an executive presidential system. 

A body of constitutional law experts has warned of a ''one-person regime'' in Turkey, a German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung has reported, quoted by DW.

The Venice Commission of the Council of Europe has prepared a report regarding the April 16 constitutional referendum in which citizens of Turkey will decide whether to replace the current parliamentary system with an executive presidency, warning that the changes would usher in a "one-person regime."

In a further blow to Turkey’s spotty global image, the Monitoring Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) called March 8 for Turkey to come under its formal scrutiny, a status reserved for members that are deemed to be backsliding on democracy. Nine countries, including Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine and Russia are currently on that hook.

A delegation of the Venice Commission, headed by Honorary President Hanna Suchocka, has arrived in Turkey to hold talks with Turkish authorities on the recent constitutional amendments.  

The visit is conducted within the framework of the preparation of an opinion on the constitutional amendments requested by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

Venice Commission, which is the constitutional consultative body of the Council of Europe, is visiting Turkey to investigate the current embattled state of media freedom under the ongoing state of emergency.

The Council of Europe has expressed "serious concerns" over the recent media restrictions in Turkey in the wake of a court ruling which placed a government-critical media group under the administration of trustees.

It was President Tayyip Erdo?an who initiated the talks between the government and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers? Party (PKK) in pursuit of a political solution to Turkey?s Kurdish problem when he was prime minister back in 2012.

A request for arbitration in relation to the autonomy of the 'Szekely Land' in Romania demanded by several local councils from the counties of Covasna, Harghita and Mures was denied on Tuesday in Strasbourg by the Monitoring Committee of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities (CLRA) of the Council of Europe.

Photo credit:: (c) Viorel LAZARESCU / AGERPRES ARCHIVE

BELGRADE)- Serbian Minister of Interior Affairs Nebojsa Stefanovic conferred on Tuesday with Samad Seyidov, rapporteur of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) Monitoring Committee.