New Finnish chairs were appointed to two committees of the Council of Europe in the same week of November. Ambassador Nina Nordström, Finland’s Permanent Representative to the Council of Europe, was elected President of the Statutory Committee of the Council of Europe anti-corruption body, GRECO. Ambassador Päivi Kairamo will again chair the Council of Europe Committee on Counter-Terrorism (CDT) in 2022.

The three-year term 2022-2024 is Finland’s first full membership in the Human Rights Council. Finland will continue its long-term work to promote universal human rights.

Adopted in June 2013, Protocol No. 15 to the European Convention on Human Rights will enter into force on 1 August 2021. Its entry into force will reduce the application period to four months and also introduce other changes to the right to submit applications to the European Court of Human Rights. The shorter application period is, however, subject to a transition period, which ends on 1 February 2022.

On 13 July 2021, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) issued a decision, which annuls the Court’s previous judgment concerning Finland in the case of N.A. v. Finland relating to the return of an asylum-seeker to Iraq in its entirety.