The EBRD mandate and ethnic minorities

This paper explores the political aspects of the Bank’s mandate in relation to ethnic minority rights and suggests the Bank’s future approach. It does so because of the threat to democratic and economic progress from increasing tension in the Bank’s region of operations between many minority groups and their countries’ governments, and also from threats to peace between separate countries.

The approach taken is to consider the status of international and regional protection of the human rights of individuals belonging to minorities, particularly through those bodies or instruments cited in the Agreement Establishing the European Bank and in the Bank’s policy paper on Procedures to Implement the Political Aspects of the Mandate of the European Bank.