24. Reminds the Council of its above-mentioned resolution of 16 March 2006, which welcomed the establishment of the UNHRC and called on the EU to play a pioneering role within that institution; welcomes, in this context, the setting-up of a mechanism aimed at holding special sessions to respond to urgent crises and human rights violations; is concerned, however, about the already high degree of politicisation of UNHRC special sessions; calls for the retention and protection of the independence of the Special Procedures; welcomes the creation of a universal periodic review mechanism and calls in this regard for an evaluation process b ...[+++]ased on the implementation of the recommendations made by UN independent mechanisms; encourages the involvement of independent civil society where appropriate, and recognises the value of the involvement of victims of human rights violations in an interactive dialogue with the international community, especially in cases where people cannot express their opinions in their own countries; calls on EU members of the UNHRC to explain their votes on all resolutions;

24. Reminds the Council of its above-mentioned resolution of 16 March 2006, which welcomed the establishment of the UNHRC and called on the EU to play a pioneering role within that institution; welcomes, in this context, the setting-up of a mechanism aimed at holding special sessions to respond to urgent crises and human rights violations; is concerned, however, about the already high degree of politicisation of UNHRC special sessions; calls for the retention and protection of the independence of the Special Procedures; welcomes the creation of a universal periodic review mechanism and calls in this regard for an evaluation process b ...[+++]ased on the implementation of the recommendations made by UN independent mechanisms; encourages the involvement of independent civil society where appropriate, and recognises the value of the involvement of victims of human rights violations in an interactive dialogue with the international community, especially in cases where people cannot express their opinions in their own countries; calls on EU members of the UNHRC to explain their votes on all resolutions;

* There is a decrease in the number of proposals concerning children and young people (28% compared to 35% in 2000). This can be understood by two factors: i) the call gave the possibility to specifically submit proposals for topics related to child sexual exploitation and paedophilia under the B5-804 budget line and ii) probably quite a number of organisations were busy preparing for both the "2nd World Congress against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children" in Yokohama in December 2001 and for the postponed UN Special Session on Children schedul ...[+++]ed for September 2001, leaving them little time to prepare and submit new proposals.

3. The Council stresses the need for continued EC and EU commitments in view of the urgency of the fight against communicable diseases and in the context of upcoming international events such as the World Health Assembly, the Conference on the Least Developed Countries, the Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly on HIV/AIDS, the EU-US Summit, the G8 Summit, the Conference in Dakar on access to treatment for people affected by HIV/AIDS and others, and calls for strong cooperation with governments and international organ ...[+++]isations.

The Council agreed to hold a special meeting on 5 November (16.00) devoted to preparation of the Extraordinary European Council on Employment.

Since the discussions indicated the possibility of decisive agreement on this important Convention, the French delegation requested that, to maintain that day's momentum, a special Justice and Home Affairs meeting be convened at an early date devoted essentially to this text.