Member States
Starting with 18 member states, soon all member states of the Council of Europe joined the Venice Commission and since 2002 non-European states can also become full members. Today, as of 2012, the Commission counts 58 member states – the 47 member states of the Council of Europe and 11 other countries. Belarus is as associate member and there are six observers. The European Commission, Palestinian National Authority and South Africa have a special co-operation status similar to that of the observers. The EU Committee of the Regions, OSCE/ODIHR and IACL/AIDC (The International Association of Constitutional Law | Association internationale de droit constitutionnel) participate in the plenary sessions of the Commission.
Read more about this topic: Venice Commission
Famous quotes containing the words member and/or states:
“If you attack the establishment long enough and hard enough, they will make you a member of it.”
—Art Buchwald (b. 1925)
“The admission of the States of Wyoming and Idaho to the Union are events full of interest and congratulation, not only to the people of those States now happily endowed with a full participation in our privileges and responsibilities, but to all our people. Another belt of States stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)