The Fundamental Rights Agency

Abstract

This chapter scrutinizes the IOR between the EU and the COE with regard to the EU FRA, whose establishment, so far, has caused the biggest conflict between the EU and the COE. The case of the FRA is particularly interesting as the EU’s decision to set up an agency tackling human rights in Europe directly affects the core business of the COE. In the wake of a potential competitor, the COE — fearing marginalization and duplication of tasks already in existence in Strasbourg — took a critical stance toward these EU developments. This reaction, however, was not understandable to EU staff that saw the Agency as a way to fill a gap in human rights protection with regard to EU institutions. This chapter inter alia sheds light on how the COE tried to intervene in order to block the set up of the FRA and in what ways the EU tried to placate the COE, via the mandate of the Agency and the FRA-COE Cooperation Agreement. Before tackling these issues in depth, the following section starts out by highlighting the antecedent situation, by introducing the FRA’s predecessor.