Workshop on the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights: how it went

On 7 December 2023 we prepared a workshop on the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights for NGOs and other institutions protecting human rights. For example, representatives of the Office of the Public Defender of Rights, the Centre for the International Legal Protection of Children and Youth or the Inakost Initiative took attended the workshop.

The Charter can be considered the EU’s fundamental bill of human rights. It is a modern human rights catalogue, conferring a number of rights that are not contained in any other document of this nature. The Charter forms part of EU primary law and therefore takes precedence over Slovak law when applying EU law.

The workshop was divided into two parts. The first, theoretical part focused on the position of the Charter in the Slovak legal order and the way it is applied in court decisions and in the drafting of laws and state policies. Further, the participants were introduced to the structure of the Charter and its implementation in the Slovak legal order.

Subsequently, the second and practical part of the workshop focused on the verification of the theoretical knowledge and its application in practice. The participants were introduced to the potential for the application of the Charter through examples of good practice of its implementation from other EU Member States, which they then discussed from the perspective of their practical background. The examples of good practice were based on the activities of national human rights institutions with a focus on litigation, commenting on laws/policies, advocacy, or awareness raising. Finally, the participants practiced the implementation of the Charter through practical model cases.

The workshop was organized within the scope of the project “Supporting National Human Rights Institutions in Monitoring Fundamental Rights and Human Rights Aspects of the Rule of Law”, which is funded by the EEA and Norway Grants under the Fund for Regional Cooperation. One of the objectives of the project is to improve the status of various institutions, administrative structures, civil society organisations or vulnerable groups by raising the level of protection of fundamental rights through the stronger implementation of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.