Human Rights. Democratic freedoms. These are not abstract ideals – they are the foundations of everything parliaments exist to protect. Yet around the world, they are being pushed into the shadows. Parliamentarians are being silenced. Hard-won protections are being rolled back. The IPU’s new campaign Bring human rights into focus is a call to bring these […]
On 4 June BGIPU hosted in the Attlee Suite of the UK Parliament a meeting of the Alliance of Parliamentary Groups “For a Democratic Belarus”. The meeting brought together representatives of 9 national parliaments, the European Parliament and PACE, as well as speakers from the Belarusian democratic forces (Office of the President-elect of Belarus, Sviatlana […]
From 1 July 2026, for the first time in its 137-year history, the Secretariat of the Inter-Parliamentary Union will be managed by a woman. Anda Filip of Romania was elected the tenth Secretary General of the IPU at the 152nd IPU Assembly in Istanbul, becoming the first woman to hold the post since the Organization […]
The IPU encourages and supports parliaments in their work to approve and implement existing treaties and conventions designed to limit the threat from chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. In 2025, after a high-level seminar organized by the IPU and United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA) on the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), Comoros formally presented […]
Between Monday 18 May and Thursday 21 May, the British Group Inter-Parliamentary Union (BGIPU) welcomed a cross-party delegation of Italian MPs and Senators to Westminster for a bilateral visit to the British Parliament. The delegation was led by Alessandro Cattaneo MP, Chair of the UK-Italy Friendship Group, alongside his parliamentary colleagues Fabrizio Benzoni MP, Gianmauro […]
Dozens of lawmakers, IPU and World Health Organization (WHO) officials and other stakeholders from around the world gathered in Geneva on 20 May 2026 for the Global Parliamentary Forum, held on the sidelines of the 79th World Health Assembly. The meeting focused on two urgent priorities: how to turn the WHO Pandemic Agreement into national reality, […]
In 2025, the National Assembly of Zambia became the latest parliament to implement the IPU’s I Say Yes to Youth in Parliament! campaign. Work began in 2021 when the Speaker signed up to the campaign, followed by the creation of the Zambia Youth Parliamentary Caucus in 2022 and a national campaign launch in 2024. Building […]
More than a decade of quiet persistence, behind-the-scenes diplomacy and public campaigning by the IPU finally paid off in 2025 when former Iraqi MP Ahmed Al-Alwani was acquitted and released after 12 years behind bars on death row. As an MP, Al-Alwani was supposed to be protected by parliamentary immunity. But he was arrested in […]
Chad’s first elections in more than a decade marked the end of a three-year transitional period and paved the way for a return to parliamentary democracy. It was fitting that the elections came shortly after Haroun Kabadi – former Speaker of Chad’s National Assembly, Head of the National Transitional Council and now President of the […]
When the Parliament of Ghana decided to take action to reduce climate-damaging greenhouse gas emissions, the IPU was on hand to offer support, technical expertise and capacity-building. We worked closely with parliamentarians to strengthen their understanding of Ghana’s commitments under the 2015 Paris Agreement, and to identify opportunities for parliamentary action – including on methane […]
