MOSCOW, January 21. /TASS/. Chairman of the Russian Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs Konstantin Kosachev thinks that all discussion of the reestablishment of dialogue between Russia and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) only comes down to Russia’s refusal to pay its monetary contribution to the Council of Europe.
During the opening of the winter plenary session of PACE on Monday, PACE President Liliane Maury Pasquier stressed the importance of all member states fulfilling their financial obligations before the organization. She also pointed out the need to continue political dialogue with Russia, adding that they need to have an honest and open discussion of existing problems, concentrating their efforts on searching for ways of regulation, and not on the differences between member countries.
"I’m afraid the whole discussion will once again boil down to reprimanding Russia due to its suspension of contribution payments, the president has mentioned it personally. However, this would only mean that PACE will once again miss the chance for dialogue that it so often mentions," Kosachev told TASS, commenting on the PACE head’s statement.
Russia and PACE
In April 2014, the Russian delegation to PACE was stripped of its key rights, including the right to vote and take part in the assembly’s governing bodies, following the developments in Ukraine and Crimea. The issue of restoring the rights of the Russian delegation was raised at PACE twice throughout 2015, but the sanctions remain in place. Russia has been deprived of the right to vote and cannot take part in the Assembly’s governing bodies and election monitoring missions. In response, Russia suspended its participation in PACE’s activities until the end of 2015. In 2016-2017, Russia skipped PACE’s meetings due to the ongoing sanctions.
In late June 2017, Russia said it was suspending its monetary contributions to the Council of Europe over its non-participation in PACE. Concurrently, it suggested PACE’s regulations be amended to ensure that no one could deprive lawmakers of their rights except their voters.
On October 10, 2018, Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjorn Jagland stated that Russia’s rights to be represented in the Council of Europe statutory bodies (the Committee of Ministers and the Parliamentary Assembly) might be suspended starting from June 2019 for systematic non-payment of membership fees. In response, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated that Russia would leave the Council of Europe on its own volition if its opponents in this organization insist on Moscow’s expulsion.
On December 10, the PACE Rules Committee opposed the deprivation of national delegations of their right to take part in elections of the organization’s secretary general and judges for the European Court of Human Rights. However, Russian Permanent Representative to the EU Vladimir Chizhov stated that Russia is not satisfied with the partial restoration of its delegations’ rights in the PACE and expects "the full and unconditional restoration of all rights" of the delegation and "the development of such rules of procedure that would prevent any such actions on the part of the assembly’s majority in the future."
Last week, the Russian State Duma (lower house of parliament) and the Russian Federation Council (upper house of parliament) both adopted a draft statement which suggests not sending the Russian delegation to the session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in January 2019. The Russian State Duma also left in force the decision to freeze Russia’s membership fees to the Council of Europe’s budget.