The Council of Europe’s human rights commissioner, Dunja Mijatovic, said in report that “unimpeded access to sexual and reproductive health care” is necessary for “a woman’s right to health and her right to be free from discrimination,” the Associated Press reported.

“Malta’s blanket ban on abortions puts these rights at significant risk,” she said.

The Council of Europe was founded by ten nations in 1949, in the wake of World War II, to promote human rights and democracy; one of its principal organizers was the anti-Fascist and devoutly Catholic Italian Prime Minister Alcide De Gasperi. A decade later, the Council established the European Court of Human Rights. Today, the Council has 46 member states.