Michael O'Flaherty is the new Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights.

Irish MP Michael O'Flaherty has become the new Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights instead of Dunja Mijatovic. He was elected to this position on January 24 at the plenary session of the winter session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization (PACE) in Strasbourg.

Note that 104 deputies voted for O'Flaherty, 70 parliamentarians voted for Meglena Kuneva (Bulgaria), and 37 for Manfred Novak (Austria).

O'Flaherty will serve as Commissioner starting April 1 for 6 years.

As a reminder, he headed the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, and before that, he was director of the Center for Human Rights at the National University of Ireland.

Also, the Commissioner for Human Rights is an independent and impartial institution established in 1999 by the Council of Europe to raise awareness of and respect for human rights in the 46 member-states of the Council of Europe. The Commissioner is elected for a non-renewable six-year term.

The Commissioner regularly visits member-states to engage in dialogue with governments and civil society and to prepare reports on issues within the scope of his/ her mandate.