Press release of the Inter-Parliamentary Union
Cairo, 16 September 1997
N° 7

Mr Miguel Angel Martínez, Member of the Parliament of Spain, was elected today the new President of the Inter-Parliamentary Council, the highest policy making body of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) -- the world organisation of parliaments. Mr Martínez's term runs for three years, until September 2000.

Mr Martínez won by 127 votes to 88 in a secret ballot, obtaining an absolute majority in a second round of voting over Mr Purno Agitok Sangma, Speaker of the Lok Sabha (Lower House of the Indian Parliament). The absolute majority required was 108 votes; 220 ballots were cast; 5 were declared void, leaving 215 valid ballots. The third candidate for the Presidency, Mr Eduardo Menem, President pro tempore of the Argentinian Senate, withdrew after a first round of voting, after receiving 43 votes, compared to 99 for Mr Martínez and 82 for Mr Sangma.

In his acceptance remarks, Mr Martínez expressed his "deep gratitude" for the support he had received from delegates -- "it is a great honour bestowed upon me" -- and pledged his time and efforts in the service of the IPU.

"We are all here in order to act in favour of the people," he declared, and called for the "co-operation of the entire Union" during the next three years. "Let us work and work hard together," he said.

In his initial presentation, Mr Martínez said he would be pursuing two "ambitions" during his presidency: working for more and better democracy in the world, and building on the effort already made to bring about a parliamentary dimension to the United Nations.

The outgoing President, Dr Ahmed Fathy Sorour, President of the Egyptian People's Assembly, expressed his conviction that Mr Martínez would "give his vast experience and personality to help the IPU to be more advanced and serve its noble goals".

The Council elected Mrs K. Kilvet (Estonia), Mrs T.V. Yaariguina (Russian Federation) and Mr M. Traoré (Burkina Faso) to the IPU's Executive Committee. They replaced Mrs V. Furubjelke (Sweden) and Mr B. Pahor (Slovenia), whose terms of office had expired, and Mr B.A. Yé (Burkina Faso) who is no longer a member of parliament.

The Council voted to adjourn consideration of the report of the Committee on the Question of the Affiliation of Palestine to the IPU's next session in Namibia, in April 1998, to allow delegates more time to consider the item. The Committee had held two meetings during the Cairo Conference. Palestine currently has observer status at the IPU.

The Council endorsed the report of the IPU Committee on Middle East questions that had met during the Cairo Conference, with representatives of the Arab delegations (Egypt and Palestine) and then separately with the Israeli delegation. Saying that "both sides considered that the peace process was in real danger", the Committee called for it to be "revived without delay".

The Committee said that a joint meeting, bringing together the Arab and Israeli representatives in the same room, had not been attempted in Cairo because the atmosphere was "hardly conducive" to attempting such a meeting in view of the renewed tensions in the area.

"The members were concerned by the visible degradation of the situation in the region but felt that they should continue to believe in the possibility of progress and hoped that their faith might be rekindled by the statements of the representatives of the Arab and Israeli Groups," the report said.

The report also said the Committee members "opposed" the Israeli settlement policies in the occupied territories and collective sanctions, saying these "prevented Palestine's economic and social development". They urged the Israeli parliamentarians to "avoid adopting" such measures.

The Committee cautioned all protagonists in the region against extremism, saying that it just led to "terrorism, violence, and counter-violence". They praised the "vision and efforts" in bringing peace to the Middle East of Egyptian President Mubarak and expressed the hope that "moderation and wisdom on all sides would prevail". (The Lebanese delegation rejected the paragraph in the report in which this point was made.)

Mrs Yusriya Loza, Member of the Egyptian People's Assembly, who presided over the Meeting of Women Parliamentarians that had taken place on the eve of the Cairo Conference, reported to the Council on the results of the Meeting. She said the women parliamentarians had a "thought-provoking and productive" debate on the impact of armed conflicts on women and children, but felt that further debate was necessary "and action even more so".

"The impact of armed conflicts is felt not only during hostilities but long afterwards," Mrs Loza told the Council. "It is physical, emotional, psychological as much as material. We are concerned that thousands of children, even very young ones, are directly involved in armed conflicts." She said that women parliamentarians would welcome an initiative by the IPU to place this subject on the agenda of a future statutory Conference, "or even better to dedicate one full conference to it in the near future".

Mrs Loza said that the Meeting initiated debate on the topic of prejudices and obstacles to be overcome by women to become parliamentarians and the impact of their work on parliamentary activities and outcome. She said the debate had so far been "very interesting" and would continue at the next Meeting of Women Parliamentarians, in Namibia in April 1998. The women MPs agreed that the IPU should collect and compile the experience of women around the world so as to permit an assessment of women's input to policies.

Mrs Loza regretted that one-third of the delegations present in Cairo still did not include women parliamentarians in their delegations. "If we believe that full-fledged democracy implies the contribution of both genders to political decision-making, what is at stake is democracy," she said, quoting from the New Delhi Declaration, adopted at IPU's Conference on "Towards Partnership between Men and Women in Politics".

Mrs Najma Heptulla (India) presented the first report to the Council on the IPU's Gender Partnership Group, created by the Executive Committee as a follow-up to the New Delhi Conference, to ensure that the interests and visions of both parts of the population are taken equally into account in all of the IPU's activities and decisions. The Group consists of two women and two men from Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin America.

Mrs Heptulla said that the Group had been asked by the Council to study the possibility of establishing in the IPU a rule which would apply equally to all delegations failing to include at least one woman among their members, as requested by IPU's Statutes, and which would decrease by two the number of votes to which those delegations would be entitled at IPU Conferences. She said that recommendations would be presented at the next conference session, in Namibia, in April 1998.

The representatives of the parties to the IPU's process of security and co-operation in the Mediterranean held a meeting during the Cairo Conference to discuss the current status of and prospects for security and co-operation in the Mediterranean as well as for the institutionalisation of the CSCM process. In particular, the parties discussed preparations for the third Conference on Security and Co-operation in the Mediterranean (IIIrd CSCM), to be held in Tunis in early 1999. They heard a report on the first thematic meeting, held in the preparation for the IIIrd CSCM, which took place in Monte Carlo, on 3-4 July 1997, on national employment policies and co-operation on job creation. They also accepted with satisfaction the invitation of the Parliament of Portugal to hold on 25-26 June 1998, the second thematic meeting. This meeting will deal with the IIIrd Basket of CSCM issues: Dialogue among civilisations and human rights.

The Council endorsed the recommendations of the IPU Committee to Monitor the Situation in Cyprus, which had conducted hearings during the Cairo Conference of the representatives of the two Cypriot communities and of the three Guarantor Powers (Greece, Turkey and the United Kingdom).

The Committee welcomed as a "very positive move" the talks earlier this year in Troutbeck and Glion-sur-Montreux between the leaders of the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot communities, and also welcomed and encouraged the continuation of the UN Secretary-General's initiatives on Cyprus. It also welcomed the meetings in Cyprus of the two leaders regarding humanitarian issues, encouraging them to strengthen their dialogue and make progress in particular concerning the relaxing of restrictions on crossing the buffer zone and inter-communal contacts.

The Committee encouraged the political parties to pursue and develop their practice of holding joint meetings, "at regular and short intervals", to support the efforts of the two leaders in their search for a negotiated settlement, within the framework defined by the United Nations.

It also expressed its "serious concern" at the renewed escalation of tension in Cyprus since July 1997, and "to sound the alarm in the face of the serious security threats, for both Cyprus and the region, entailed in the current volatile situation".

The Committee also appealed for "every effort" to be made to secure the progressive demilitarisation of the island, notably repeating its call on Turkey to withdraw its troops from northern Cyprus and to refrain from upgrading its military presence there, and urging the Government of the Republic of Cyprus to reverse its decision to deploy S-300 anti-aircraft missiles on the island and to refrain from any further acquisition of armaments, in order to ease the way to a politically negotiated settlement.

The Council took note of the report of the IPU's Committee to Promote Respect for International Humanitarian Law (IHL), and adopted a resolution on the results of a world survey on the national application by parliaments of the rules of IHL and on anti-personnel mines.

Although the replies from the survey had only been received from 41 percent of the IPU's members, the report said that they already clearly highlighted that parliaments have a key role to play in promoting respect for IHL and ensuring that violations are punished, and that parliamentary action in the field "remains relatively insufficient". With some 50 armed conflicts having taken place since the Second World War as well as numerous humanitarian crises, parliaments "have to attach increased importance to establishing adequate standards and taking steps to prevent violation of IHL rules through education and training", especially of the armed forces.

It also concluded that "the question of anti-personnel mines requires the attention of parliaments, and a complete ban is urgently needed if we are to promote sustainable development and also halt the human suffering inflicted by indiscriminate use of landmines".

In its resolution, the Council called for the setting up or development of adequate parliamentary and governmental mechanisms for the promotion and implementation of the rules of IHL. The resolution promotes the early establishment of the International Criminal Court, being studied by the UN, and urges parliaments to adopt legislation to ban recruitment of children under 18, and to demobilise child soldiers.

Moreover, it urged all governments to sign, in Ottawa in December 1997, the comprehensive International Humanitarian Law treaty prohibiting anti-personnel mines now under preparation and it urged all parliaments to arrange for the earliest possible national ratification of the treaty and the adoption of the enabling legislation and regulations. It urged all States to work on international landmine clearance efforts and fund the UN Voluntary Trustee Fund for Mine Clearance; and the government and parliament of all concerned countries to release appropriate resources for the treatment and rehabilitation of landmine victims and promote mine-awareness programmes for civilians.

The Council authorised the Committee to continue gathering and updating information on the national application of IHL and report back in one year's time.

The Chairman of the IPU's Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians, Senator Hugo Batalla (Uruguay), reported to the Council on public cases of 132 members or former members of parliament in 12 countries whose basic rights to freedom of speech and action have been violated because of arbitrary measures taken against them (Burundi, Cambodia, Colombia, Djibouti, Gambia, Honduras, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nigeria, Togo and Turkey).

Mr Batalla said that the Committee, during its sessions in Cairo, had also examined a nearly equal number of confidential cases. Mr Batalla expressed the Committee's "deep concern" about these cases, and the Council proceeded to adopt a series of resolutions on them. (The resolutions can all be found on the IPU's Website: http://www.ipu.org.)

The 99^th Inter-Parliamentary Conference will be held in Windhoek, Namibia, from 6 to 11 April 1998. The Council chose the following two main themes for debate at the Conference:

• The prevention of conflicts and the restoration of peace and trust in countries emerging from war, the return of refugees to their countries of origin, the strengthening of democratic processes and the hastening of reconstruction.
• Action to combat HIV/AIDS in view of its devastating human, economic and social impact.