Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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Question 78: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the discussions that have been held within the European Council of Ministers with regard to a prisoner (details supplied) whose case has received the support of European institutions previously; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [30898/07]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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The individual to whom the Deputy refers, a former member of the American Indian Movement, was convicted of the 1975 murder of two United States Federal Agents by the United States District Court in Fargo, Minneapolis in 1977. Mr. Peltier was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences, a sentence which has been upheld on numerous occasions by the US appellate courts. I am aware that, in December 1994 and again in February 1999, the European Parliament adopted resolutions calling for clemency for Mr. Peltier.

The European Union holds bi-annual human rights consultations with the United States, during which both general principles and individual cases are discussed. The European Union raises individual cases of human rights violations with third countries in accordance with the European Union Guidelines on Human Rights; notably, the Guidelines on the Death Penalty, the Guidelines on Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and the Guidelines on Human Rights Defenders. The case of Mr. Peltier is not considered to fall within any of these Guidelines. The Council of Ministers has not discussed the case raised by the Deputy.