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RF Supreme Court finds lawful State Duma decision to strip Gudkov of deputy mandate

Judge Nikolai Tolcheyev turned down Gudkov's petition seeking to overturn the parliament's resolution dated September 14, 2012

MOSCOW, February 12 (Itar-Tass) – The Russian Supreme Court confirmed the lawfulness of the State Duma decision to strip A Just Russia member Gennady Gudkov of deputy mandate.

Thus, judge Nikolai Tolcheyev turned down a lawsuit from Gudkov, who asked to cancel the State Duma resolution over the early termination of his deputy powers on September 14, 2012.

The Supreme Court noted that the State Duma resolution does not contradict the Russian legislation and was approved with the procedure of taking similar decisions observed.

The court has passed the verdict after the examination of the positions of the litigating parties that were stated during the 3-hour court hearings. Generalizing the evidence found in the case the litigating parties shared the view that this trial is important for the development of democracy in the country.

“The importance of the trial is comparable with the defence of the rule of the people,” State Duma representative Vladimir Ponezhevsky stated.

“For the absolutely false suspicion I was stripped of deputy mandate, which was given to me by more than 200,000 Muscovites, but not members of the State Duma. This is a matter of political struggle, as the principle of political expediency was determining in the repressions in the twentieth century and the decision to strip me of deputy mandate was based on the same principle,” Gudkov said.

Gudkov devoted over 30 minutes of his speech to the survey of the claims, which were made against him for business activities. He rejected all accusations again and named the State Duma decision to unseat him groundless, hasty and contradicting the spirit of the State Duma regulations.

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