Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-10-23-Speech-3-266"
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"en.20021023.5.3-266"2
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"As a matter of principle, the Council never comments on press reports. When comments are issued, it is the Presidency that issues them. With regard to the visit in question, I should like to make it clear that, during her visit, the Belgian Deputy Prime Minister, Mrs Onkelinx, expressed her condemnation of stoning. Moreover, she repeated the European Union’s position on the matter in order to dispel any misunderstanding of what had been said during the discussion in question.
Human rights issues – and, specifically, the use of cruel forms of execution such as stoning – have always been high on the agenda of the comprehensive political dialogue that takes place at the half-yearly meetings between Iran and the EU. At the most recent meeting in Teheran on 10 September 2002, a number of specific human rights issues were also discussed. Furthermore, the EU makes regular overtures in connection with such matters. We are at the moment aware of three cases in Iran in which people have been sentenced to death by stoning. All three sentences have been appealed against, so the judgments are still not final. There must be no doubt at all that the Council will follow these cases very carefully.
More generally, I can inform you that the EU has discussed an initiative aimed at establishing a formal human rights dialogue with Iran on the basis of the guidelines for dialogues with third countries approved by the Council in December of last year. Not until this month did European and Iranian human rights experts meet for a series of exploratory talks in Teheran.
I should also like to add that human rights are one of the four essential areas in which the Council has stated that it wishes to see progress, now that the EU and Iran are in the process of developing close trade relations.
On 21 October, that is to say a couple of days ago, the Council emphasised that it considers it very important that a human rights dialogue should offer an opportunity to achieve practical improvements regarding respect for human rights. It decided therefore to embark upon such a dialogue on the basis of the conditions, timetable, subjects, benchmark points – that is to say, objectives – and choice of interlocutors discussed in the course of the EU’s fact-finding mission to Iran. It was also decided that the first meeting within the framework of this dialogue should take place as early as this year in Teheran. Finally, the Council has, on the basis of an initiative by the Presidency, very recently brought up a number of matters in quite a few different countries, including Iran. On the basis of this initiative, the Council adopted, on 30 September, a declaration on the death penalty and, in particular, cruel forms of execution. In its declaration, the Council again emphasises, clearly and unambiguously, that the EU repudiates the death penalty and, in particular, execution by stoning."@en1
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