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If you want to know what action the Committee of Ministers (CM) has taken on a particular topic, start your search with the document type decisions.

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The decisions are adopted by the CM and contain links to any other related texts (for example, Recommendations, Resolutions …) and to the working documents which provide the background to the decision.

Adopted texts

The Committee of Ministers adopts several types of texts:

  • Decisions (CM/Del/Dec)
  • Declarations (Decl)
  • Council of Europe Treaties (ETS and CETS)
  • Recommendations to member States (CM/Rec)
  • Replies to the Parliamentary Assembly (CM/AS/Rec, CM/AS/Quest) and the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities (CM/Cong/Rec)
  • Resolutions (CM/Res)
  • Terms of reference for Council of Europe intergovernmental committees and subordinate bodies

These documents  are available on the Adopted texts page and more information on the different types of texts is available here. All adopted texts are public.

Working and information documents

These include reports, information documents, draft texts for adoption by the Committee of Ministers, proposed amendments concerning items on the Deputies and subgroup meetings, along with others.

They are usually issued in the following series:

  • CM: documents concerning items on the agendas of plenary meetings and generally giving rise to a decision
  • DD: various information documents / statements / proposed amendments concerning items on the Deputies’ and subgroup meetings, distributed at the request of the Chair, delegations or the Secretariat
  • DH-DD: various documents concerning items on the human rights ("DH") meetings, including information from Contracting Parties / governments, action plans / action reports received from respondent States, information from injured parties and information from NGOs, national human rights institutions and international intergovernmental organisations or their bodies or agencies
  • CM/AS/Rec, CM/AS/Quest, CM/Cong/Rec: draft replies to the Parliamentary Assembly and the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities
  • SG/Inf: information documents from the Secretary General, prepared under the responsibility of the Private Office
  • SG/Com: communication from the Secretary General and the Deputy Secretary General
  • CM/Inf: information documents which generally do not require a decision
  • CM/Inf/DH: documents concerning cases on the agendas of human rights ("DH") meetings (prepared by the Department for the execution of judgments and decisions of the European Court of Human Rights)
  • Subsidiary group documents
  • CM/Bur/Del: information documents and reports of the Bureau of the Ministers' Deputies

These documents are generally classified (see the rules governing access to documents).

Meeting documents

These documents concern the preparation and records of Committee of Ministers and subgroup meetings.

Ministerial Sessions

  • Minutes (CM/PV) - include the statements made and decisions adopted at Sessions

Meetings of the Ministers' Deputies

  • Agendas (CM/Del/OJ)
  • Orders of business (CM/Del/OT)
  • Notes on the Agenda (CM/Notes) - explanatory notes on items on the agendas of meetings; they normally include draft decisions
  • Decisions (CM/Del/Dec) - decisions adopted by the Ministers' Deputies
  • Records (CM/Del/Act) - statements for the record whose insertion is requested by delegations

Subsidiary group meetings

  • Convocations - the meeting agendas
  • Annotated agendas - explanatory notes on the items on the agendas
  • Synopses - the meeting reports

These documents are generally classified (see the rules governing access to documents).
 

More information
Nomenclature of CM documentation

  The definitions of CM document references can be found in the table below.

Access to documents

Please login to see classified documents

Many of the documents relating to the work of the Committee of Ministers (CM) are classified "restricted" at the time of issue, which means that only the governments of member and observer States and the Secretariat of the Council of Europe have access to them. The majority of these documents are declassified immediately after the meeting at which they are examined by the CM, although certain documents may remain classified for one year from the date of issue.

Documents prepared by the Ministers’ Deputies' working groups (GR-C, GR-DEM, etc.) are usually classified "restricted" for one year from the date of issue.

Very rarely, a document may be classified “confidential" at the time of issue, which means that only member State governments have access to it. Confidential documents are declassified after 10 years.

The texts currently in force on access to documents are CM/Del/Dec(1998)641/1.3 and CM/Del/Dec(2000)735/1.5a, para. 7.