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Sixty years ago, 100 members of parliament from twelve European countries – including some of the great founding fathers of the European movement – gathered in the main lecture theatre of the University of Strasbourg for the first ever meeting of the “Consultative Assembly” (soon to become the Parliamentary Assembly) of the Council of Europe, the organisation which had been signed into existence in London only three months earlier to “forge closer ties” among its ten founding nations.
During 18 sittings, held over nearly a month during that historic summer, they debated with grave conviction how to reconcile and reconstruct a Europe still emerging from war yet facing new division, launched the astonishing concept of a universal Court to protect human rights, and gave to the citizens of Europe – for the first time – a unified voice in the great affairs of state.
This website seeks to recreate, through words and images, the high hopes of that distant summer in order to mark the 60th anniversary of the Parliamentary Assembly, still a unique forum where the values of Europe are championed, and pay tribute to the enduring vision of its founding members.
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