European and African leaders should go beyond promises and act to end atrocities, hold abusers to account and combat corruption, Human Rights Watch said today. The first European Union-Africa summit for seven years will be held in Lisbon on December 8-9, 2007.

Portugal should use its presidency of the European Union to step up the defense of rights worldwide, Human Rights Watch said today. Portugal takes over the rotating EU Presidency from Germany for six months beginning on July 1.

When he was here last week, Prime Minister Jose Socrates told Russia’s President Vladimir Putin that there would be no more European Union moralizing about Russia’s human rights record, saying that “no one should claim to lecture anyone else" [“ninguém pretenda dar lições a ninguém"]. This was a victory for Putin’s increasingly authoritarian policies, a terrible blow to Russia’s besieged civil society, and a bad omen for Portugal’s upcoming presidency of the European Union.