Debates on attacks against journalists and media freedom in Europe, the challenges and accountability of online media and journalism, and the need to end cyber discrimination and online hate speech will be at the heart of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) winter plenary part-session to be held in Strasbourg from 23 to 27 January 2017.
As the organization reports in a released statement, there have also been requests for urgent debates on “The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey” and on “When generosity, kindness, humanity and Western democratic freedoms are answered with radical intolerance and violence: an urgent call to reform the failed European migration, integration, security and border policies”, as well as for a current affairs debate on the situation in Syria and its effects on surrounding countries.
Addressing the Assembly will be Nicos Anastasiades, President of Cyprus, Klaus Iohannis, President of Romania, and Johannes Hahn, European Commissioner for European Neighbourhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations. Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, will present his communication to Assembly members, and Ioannis Kasoulides, the Cypriot Foreign Minister, will be speaking in the context of the Cypriot Chairmanship of the Committee of Ministers.
Other highlights of the session will be the debates on the functioning of democratic institutions in Ukraine, the situation in Lebanon and challenges for regional stability and European security, and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
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Elections of the President and the Vice-Presidents of the Assembly are expected to take place on the opening day of the session with the final agenda to be adopted after that.