"Without justice, there is no recovery. Without institutions, there is no trust. And without law, no lasting peace is possible", said Council of Europe Secretary General Alain Berset at the 2025 (URC2025), co-hosted by Italy and Ukraine. Speaking on the panel on Strengthening Rule of Law Through Integrity and Enforcement Efforts, Alain Berset emphasised that rebuilding Ukraine must begin with trust in public institutions and the rule of law.
"Our ultimate goal is to build legal certainty. That means judges appointed on merit. Recovery of stolen assets. Oversight of public funds. And because recovery must reach all parts of society, we support legal aid for torture survivors, trauma services for children, and access to rights for the displaced."
Other speakers on the panel included Carlo Nordio, Minister of Justice, Italy; Olha Stefanishyna, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice, Ukraine; Mathias Cormann, Secretary General, OECD; Stephen Doughty, Minister of State for Europe, North America and Overseas Territories, United Kingdom; Viktor Pavlushchyk, Head of the National Agency on Corruption Prevention, Ukraine, and Denys Maslov, Chair of the Supreme Rada Committee on Legal Policy, Ukraine.
Following previous meetings in Lugano, London and Berlin, the URC2025 brought together global political leaders, representatives of international organisations and financial institutions, private sector actors, local and regional authorities, civil society and the Ukrainian diaspora.
Held in Rome on 10-11 July, the high-level event was dedicated to the recovery, rebuilding, reform, modernisation, and long-term reconstruction of Ukraine. The conference focused on four key themes: mobilising the private sector for reconstruction and economic growth; the human dimension: social recovery and human capital for the future of Ukraine; the recovery of municipalities and regions, and European Union (EU) accession and related reforms.
The Commissioner for Human Rights, Michael O'Flaherty, said "Ukraine's recovery must be built on human rights, where return is voluntary, reconstruction is people-centred, and no one, from veterans to abducted children, is left behind."
"Ukraine's recovery is not just about rebuilding cities but about reaffirming a democratic European identity. Local governance is the foundation upon which that identity is built", said Marc Cools, President of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities.
The Special Envoy of Secretary General on the situation of children of Ukraine, Thórdís Kolbrún Reykfjord Gylfadóttir and the Council of Europe Development Bank, represented by Governor Carlo Monticelli, also took part in the URC2025.
The Council of Europe and Ukraine since Russia's military aggression
Since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the Council of Europe has been mobilising all available instruments to ensure the Russian Federation's full accountability for violations of human rights and for serious violations of international law, as well as for providing compensation to the victims of Russia's aggression.
On 25 June, Ukraine and the Council of Europe signed a bilateral agreement on establishing a Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression. It marks an important major step toward holding to account those responsible, addressing a gap where existing international courts currently lack jurisdiction over this crime.
As the legal arm of the Council of Europe, the European Court of Human Rights is the only international court adjudicating human rights violations stemming from Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine. The Court has processed several inter-State cases concerning the Russian war on Ukraine and also many individual cases of human rights violations in this context. Thousands of individual cases are still pending before the Court.
On 9 July, the European Court of Human Rights delivered a historic judgment in Ukraine and the Netherlands v. Russia. The ruling addresses serious human rights violations starting with the conflict in eastern Ukraine involving pro-Russian separatists in 2014, and continuing through Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine launched on 24 February 2022.
The Court unanimously found Russia accountable for a series of widespread and flagrant abuses of human rights, including those related to the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17. These violations were committed in flagrant disregard for the foundations of the international legal order established after the Second World War - the very foundation of the Council of Europe.
