Seat of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg.
The Council of Europe will issue an opinion on the amnesty law before March 15th. At the end of last week, the plenary session of the Venice Commission, a body dependent on this institution made up of 46 states on the continent, approved the request of the Spanish Senate to issue a report with its opinion on the draft bill in progress. to amnesty in Congress any crimes that may have been committed during the Catalan trial. Also during this period, it will prepare another report, in this case general, on the requirements that an amnesty must meet in a constitutional state, which was adopted at the request of Tiny Vox, President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. explains this international organization. .
According to Council of Europe sources, allowing these types of petitions to be processed is quite common. And when a bill is assessed, it usually happens quickly, so that the statement is received during the parliamentary process.
On December 15th and 16th, the plenary session of the Venice Commission met in the city of the same name. Just two days earlier, the Spanish Senate had approved the request for this constitutional advisory body to prepare “an urgent opinion” on the controversial Spanish law. Five days earlier, on December 8, the President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the Dutch socialist Tiny Kox, had requested from the same institution a general study on what requirements amnesty laws should impose on a constitutional state.
Both motions were accepted and the reports should be ready for the next plenary session on March 14th and 15th. By then there should be a report on a controversial law passed in Hungary last week known as the Law on Defense of National Sovereignty.
The Venice Commission has already decided on another very controversial Spanish law in March 2021: the Citizen Security Law, better known as the Gag Law. The opinion given was that Spain should reform the regulation and reduce the high fines provided for in the regulation, which are still in force since the last legislature's attempt to change it failed. “If a legal norm leads to abuses in practice, that norm should be amended, delimited or provided with additional protections, even if it is theoretically constitutionally acceptable,” says this opinion on the law that is still in force.
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