The third summit meeting of the Council of Europe opened in the Royal Castle in Warsaw Monday with participation of leaders or their representatives from 46 member states.
The meeting is designed to reaffirm shared core values of member states and chart actions for the coming years. It will be composed of three plenary session with each focusing on one topic from security to anti-drug trafficking.
In his opening speech, Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski said that Poland attaches great importance to inter-cultural dialogue because two very different cultures in Europe meet here.
He said that the Council of Europe is aimed to achieve continental unity beyond boundaries by resorting to rule of law, democracy and protection of human rights.
The summit meeting is to summarize achievements made so far and map out a plan for future actions to tackle poverty on the continent and problems of organized crimes.
The continent still has "areas of unacceptable poverty" and every citizen in the family of nations should enjoy democracy and contribute to the building of European architecture, he said.
To guarantee security during the summit meeting, the Polish authorities have put in place stringent security measures. From early Sunday, the whirl of helicopters could be heard over the capital, and more than 10,000 police officers have been deployed on the streets surrounding the summit meeting's venue.
High on the agenda of the meeting are issues on trafficking of human beings, terrorism, money laundering, organized crime, minorities' rights and violence against children.
Conventions on human-trafficking, prevention of terrorism and the financing of terrorist acts are expected to be signed.
Founded in 1949, the Council of Europe took in its 46th member, Monaco, in October 2004. It has granted observer status to Canada, Japan, Mexico, the United States and the Vatican. Belarus has applied to join the organization.
The first summit meeting of the organization was held in Vienna in October 1993 and the second one held four years later in Strasbourg where the Council of Europe was based.
(Xinhua News Agency May 17, 2005))
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