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Record number of delegations register for St. Petersburg-hosted IPU Assembly

At least 91 parliament speakers plan to take part in the Assembly, high above the earlier record figure of 51

© Piotr Kovalev/TASS

MOSCOW, September 22. /TASS/. An unprecedented amount of delegations, 152, have stated their willingness to take part in the 137th assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) that St. Petersburg will host from October 14 to 18, the chairman of the Russian Federation Council’s international affairs committee told a news conference in Moscow on Friday.

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"The very decision to hold a next assembly of the IPU on Russian soil was from the very start bitterly disputed and blocked the Ukrainian delegation. Now we can say that Ukraine’s policy towards boycotting Russia, derailing our initiatives finds itself in splendid solitude," said Konstantin Kosachev.

"As of today, our data says that 152 national delegations out of 173 plan to take part in the assembly, which is a record high," the senior legislator from the upper house of the Russian parliament added.

He said the biggest amount of the delegations ever taking part in a IPU assembly was 147. Besides, the legislator expects that the number of registered delegations "will most likely grow".

He also said that the 91 parliament speakers plan to take part in the Assembly, high above the earlier record figure of 51.

The 137th assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union will take place in St. Petersburg in mid-October. This decision was taken at the 135th assembly in Geneva despite opposition from Ukraine and several other national delegations. St. Petersburg earned 138 out of 159 votes during the balloting. The Inter-Parliamentary Union is the oldest (established in 1889) and one of the most authoritative international parliamentary organizations in the world in addition to being an informal parliamentary dimension of the UN. This Union has members from 170 countries and 11 inter-parliamentary unions are listed as associated members.

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