“Strengthening democracy, Human Rights, the rule of law as well as good governance and democratic participation at all levels is a shared responsibility of national, local and regional authorities” Congress Vice-President Bernd Vöhringer stressed at the opening of the 5^th European conference on democracy and Human Rights in Kristiansand on 6 May 2024. Referring to worrying trends of democratic erosion, he called for manyfold responses “with all actors at all levels collaborating to protect our hard-earned democratic principles, in line with the outcomes of the Summit of Heads of State and Government held in Reykjavik almost one year ago”. He underlined that “local and regional authorities are at the forefront to directly influence people's lives with their actions and have a crucial role to play to contribute to make European democracy more stable and more resilient”. Highlighting that the Congress adapted very quickly to the outcomes of Reykjavik by revising its priorities and upholding its focus on human rights, he said the Congress placed itself and its members - the local and regional elected representatives - at the service of intangible rights which, if better implemented, will serve the cause of democratic stability in Europe. In the face of the continuing war of aggression that Russia has started against Ukraine, Vice-President Vöhringer recalled that the Congress is engaged in concrete support to Ukraine by contributing to the High-Level Dialogue on good democratic governance with Ukrainian authorities, focusing on local government legislation and decentralisation issues and involving in initiatives on Ukraine’s recovery and reconstruction as well as on the to the work of the Register of Damage adopted by the Reykjavik Summit.