BRUSSELS, 06/12/06 - The Netherlands has become the last of the 25 EU countries to back the establishment of an EU human rights agency. The Upper House yesterday dropped its objections.

The proposal for the agency was supported Monday by 24 EU countries at a justice ministers meeting. The Netherlands had made its support conditional on consulting with the Upper House, which earlier complained that the new EU institution would do the same work as the existing Council of Europe.

Other EU countries however turned out Monday and yesterday to be prepared to restrict the agency considerably. They also accepted a plea by the Netherlands that the agency must not interfere with the police and judiciary.

The agency is to advise EU bodies if proposals touch human rights. It will concentrate on the EU countries and EU candidate countries such as Turkey. The agency may be able to look at other countries as well later.

The EU currently only has an observation centre for racism, which produces a report annually without much results.