News release: “The Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers has just adopted the organisation’s budgets for the year 2009. The ordinary budget amounts to € 205 million, based on a zero real growth of member States’ contributions. As the Council of Europe enters its seventh decade in 2009, the Ordinary budget is characterised by three watchwords: focus, consolidation and efficiency, to finance increases in expenditure by the European Court of Human Rights and the Commissioner for Human Rights and adequate funding for priorities in the Programme of Activities.”