50TH ANNIVERSARY OF EUROPEAN CONVENTION ON HUMAN RIGHTS

VATICAN CITY, NOV 3, 2000 (VIS) - Pope John Paul this morning welcomed 200 participants in the Ministerial Conference of the Council of Europe, being held to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the signing in Rome on November 4, 1950 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

"After the Second World War," said the Pope, "the Council adopted a new political vision and embodied a new juridical order, enshrining the principle that respect for human rights transcends national sovereignty and cannot be subordinated to political aims or compromised by national interests." He said the 1950 European Convention was "a truly historic document, ... seeking to proclaim and safeguard the fundamental rights of every citizen of the signatory States."

The Holy Father pointed out that, after the fall of communism, "the new democracies of Eastern Europe turned to the Council of Europe as the focus of unity for all the peoples of the continent, a unity which cannot be conceived without the religious and moral values where are the common heritage of all the European nations." He underscored the Holy See's involvement in the Council and its special interest in the European Court of Human Rights.

This is "a time of thanks for what has been achieved," John Paul II said, adding it is also "a time to recognize clearly the problems that must be addressed." Among these are "the tendency to separate human rights from their anthropological foundation, ... and the tendency to interpret rights solely from an individualistic perspective, with little consideration for the role of the family as 'the fundamental unit of society'. And there is the paradox that, on the one hand, the need to respect human rights is vigorously affirmed while, on the other, the most basic of them all - the right to life - is denied."

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