Changes from report parliamentary committee draft to plenary report

Each year, the European Parliament adopts three annual reports on the EU’s foreign, security and defence, and human rights policies.

The three reports are on:

• the implementation of the Common Foreign and Security Policy - annual report 2025 (based on the report of the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Policy to the European Parliament on the Common Foreign and Security Policy) - competence of the AFET Committee,

• Human Rights and Democracy in the world and the European Union’s policy on the matter - annual report 2025 (based on the EU Annual report on Human Rights and Democracy in the World) - competence of the DROI Subcommittee, and

• the implementation of the Common Security and Defence Policy - annual report 2025 (based on the report of the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Policy to the European Parliament on the Common Foreign and Security Policy) - competence of the SEDE Committee.

These reports monitor and assess the implementation of the Common Foreign and Security Policy, including the EU policy on Human Rights and the Common Security and Defence Policy. They are a key component of the European Parliament’s contribution to EU foreign policy making, most notably in regard to the strengthened right of scrutiny conferred to the European Parliament by the Treaty of Lisbon. It is essential that the European Parliament respond to the annual reports issued by other institutions as soon as they are published.

This report focuses on the most salient trends in challenges to human rights and democracy, and on an evaluation of the EU external policy tools that aim to ensure that the Union and its Member States promote and protect the universality and the indivisibility of human rights around the world.

This report contributes to the ongoing preparations for a new Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy for the post-2027 period by evaluating the current EU toolbox in the field of human rights and democracy and providing its recommendations to the other EU institutions for further developing it.