A/HRC/40/65 human rights at the forefront of their work, including by ensuring that States implemented international human rights treaties. 62. Mr. Krauss referred to mainstreaming human rights in the external policies of the European Union in order to promote the universality and indivisibility of human rights. The European Parliament had recently legislated on data protection, access to justice, the European Pillar of Social Rights, and initiatives to combat inequality, discrimination and hate speech. He acknowledged that heterogeneity of human rights standards between States, as well as backsliding in recent years, were of concern and, consequently, cooperation between the European Parliament and the parliaments of European Union members needed to be reinforced. Mr. Krauss described how the European Parliament oversaw the human rights dimension of the European Union’s external policies. The European Parliament’s practice of inviting special procedures of the Human Rights Council to address it should be replicated by national parliaments. Special procedures’ recommendations were included in the European Parliament’s resolutions. When Members of the European Parliament travelled abroad, the European Parliament included special procedures’ findings in briefings, in addition to information about the ratification and implementation of human rights treaties. The European Parliament focused on promoting democracy and human rights capacity-building programmes for national parliaments. In interparliamentary meetings, Members of the European Parliament encouraged their counterparts to access the United Nations human rights mechanisms, strengthen cooperation between such mechanisms and regional ones, and develop human rights committees. Mr. Krauss emphasized that all actors, including civil society, should be involved in drafting and implementing legislation. Mr. Krauss mentioned the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, and ongoing work with the laureates through the Sakharov Prize Network and the Sakharov Fellowship for Human Rights Defenders. The Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought was awarded annually by the European Parliament to individuals who had made an exceptional contribution to promoting human rights. 63. Participants agreed that democracy, human rights and the rule of law were inextricably linked to each other and were connected to the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals. They called for human rights to be studied in schools in order to build a culture of human rights. They discussed the value of youth parliaments in preparing young people to be parliamentarians. Participants referred to the challenge to democracy posed by far-right political parties. The discussions suggested that mainstream politicians needed to address issues of concern for those who felt excluded by globalization, refer to States’ international law obligations set out in human rights treaties, and depoliticize discussions. Some argued that constitutional courts should ban parties that went against the constitutional order. 64. Temporary special measures, for example quotas, were discussed as a means to move ahead faster towards gender parity, respond to the wishes of civil society, and contribute to evolving ways of thinking. The important role of parliaments in relation to protecting the rule of law was stressed. The non-implementation of court judgments and decisions of the human rights treaty bodies was considered as bringing the rule of law into disrepute; their implementation should be a legal and political issue requiring parliamentary scrutiny. The establishment of national mechanisms for implementation, reporting and follow-up was discussed. 65. Participants welcomed the Draft Principles on Parliaments and Human Rights (A/HRC/38/25, annex I), which provided guidance for the setting up of parliamentary human rights committees and for ensuring their effective functioning. The principles were based on a study of best practices in parliaments, which had been a parliamentarian-driven exercise. Parliamentarians should own the next steps of the process, including the adoption of such draft principles. Participants encouraged States to support the draft principles, which reflected best practices from parliaments around the world. They called for parliamentarians to provide input to States’ reports to the universal periodic review, including through human rights committees. 16