Caption
Migrants storm a barbed-wire fence as they attempt to cross the land border with Spain's African enclave of Ceuta near Fnideq in northern Morocco on September 15, 2024. (Getty Images)
Caption
Alain Berset, secretary general of the Council of Europe, speaking in the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo on April 28, 2026. (Getty Images)
The Council of Europe is the oldest intergovernmental organization devoted to human rights in Europe. With 46 member states and nearly 700 million citizens, it has built a vast legal framework on human rights and democracy and has developed hundreds of conventions, treaties, and agreements since its founding in 1949.
In the aftermath of the Cold War, for example, the council supported Eastern European countries as they overhauled their legal systems. Today, it has made Ukraine its top priority and has sought to hold Russia accountable for its violations of human rights.
Perhaps because the United States is not a member state—it enjoys observer status—the Council of Europe is not well known in Washington. Worse, it is sometimes mistaken for the European Union’s European Council.
Join Secretary General Alain Berset as he explains the Council of Europe’s role today and its future plans. After his remarks, he will sit down with Senior Fellow Peter Rough for a fireside chat.
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Migrants attempt to swim from Morocco to Ceuta, Spain, on July 30, 2026. (Getty Images)
Caption
President Donald Trump delivers remarks during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron on February 24, 2025, in Washington, DC. (Getty Images)
Caption
This photograph shows a Dassault Rafale aircraft parked on the tarmac of the French Air and Space Force Luxeuil-Saint-Sauveur Airbase in Saint-Sauveur, France, on March 18, 2025. (Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images)
