FC: Council of Europe may boot U.S. because of death penalty

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

Some history:
1. Council of Europe drafts, with U.S. encouragement, controversial 
"cybercrime" treaty: http://www.politechbot.com/p-02173.html
2. CoE decides it feels like banning racist remarks or other "hate speech." 
Whoops! The U.S. delegation remembers the First Amendment and bows out of 
the so-called First Protocol: http://www.politechbot.com/p-02785.html
3. CoE secretly meets last week to add a Second Protocol (aka another 
addition) to the treaty. That one, somewhat mysteriously, deals with 
intercepting and decrypting terrorist communiques: 
http://www.politechbot.com/p-03159.html

List of CoE member nations:
http://www.coe.int/T/E/Communication_and_Research/Public_Relations/About_Council_of_Europe/CoE_Map_&_Members/

-Declan

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From: Anonymous User <anonymous () remailer havenco com>
To: declan () well com
Subject: UPI: Council of Europe Threatens US Expulsion Over Death
Date: Sun, 24 Feb 2002 02:26:33 +0000 (UTC)

woohoo!  Can't wait to get as far away from those socialists as
possible, and this is as good a reason as any.

FYI, the CoE is the organization drafting the Convention on Cybercrime,
which among other things outlaws "hate speech" on the Net (as defined
by them):

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,50529,00.html

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20020222/wr_nm/tech_internet_hatespeech_dc_1
---
>From United Press International, available online at:
http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=22022002-040505-3670r

US faces European ban over death penalty

By Chris White
United Press International
Published 2/22/2002 8:24 AM

BRUSSELS, Belgium, Feb. 22 (UPI) -- The United States faces possible
exclusion from the Council of Europe, where it enjoys observer status,
over its continued use of the death penalty, a council spokeswoman said
Friday.

The comments follow a decision of the council's Committee of Ministers
on Thursday to ban the death penalty in all circumstances, including
for crimes committed during war and the imminent threat of war.

"You know what Europe thinks of America," council spokeswoman Henriette
Girard told United Press International. "It may now be a case of
expelling the United States from its observer status. This is being
looked at."

The Council of Europe, comprised of 43 member countries from the
European continent and five observer countries, is the first
organization to have drawn up a legal text on the abolition of the
death penalty, which allows no exception. It already was a de facto
rule and no executions have taken place in member countries since March
1997.

The latest initiative, adding a protocol to the European Convention on
Human Rights, was promoted by Sweden in 2000, well before last
September's terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.

Called Protocol 13, the ban is to be presented for signature by members
at the next session of the Committee of Ministers, the Council's
decision-making body.

[...]




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