MOSCOW, March 20 (Itar-Tass) – A Just Russia Deputy Dmitry Gudkov said on Wednesday beforehand that he wouldn’t attend today’s ethics commission meeting that was to look into the issue of his trip to the U. S.
“I won’t attend this meeting because, as I was told yesterday, it will be held behind closed doors,” he told RSN radio.
Gudkov said that all of the committee’s future decisions had been agreed in advance and he was perfectly aware of them. He claimed that he would be denied the right to address the State Duma for one month and disciplined, told to apologize and hand in his mandate as well.
“Nothing new or important,” Gudkov said.
Earlier the representatives of all four factions, Sergey Zheleznyak (United Russia), Igor Lebedev (LDPR), Oleg Denisenko (CPRF) and Svetlana Goryacheva (A Just Russia) complained against Gudkov to the ethics commission. The deputies want it “to assess Dmitry Gudkov’s behavior during his trip to the U.S., when he delivered a speech at a Freedom House forum on March 5, 2013. Some members of the U.S. Senate, including James McGovern, the author of the anti-Russian Magnitsky Act, were in the audience.”
The document describes Gudkov’s report as “strongly- worded and anti-Russian and aimed at discrediting our country.” Particularly, the four Duma members mentioned Gudkov's claims the State Duma was “an obedient parliament” adopting “anti-constitutional bills”, and his statements in support of the Magnitsky Act, as well as the request for U.S. support in tackling problems inside Russia.
“We believe that Gudkov’s statements are tantamount to calls for illegal acts impinging on Russian sovereignty. Gudkov’s conduct demonstrates his disrespect for the requirements mandatory for the members of the Russian parliament, a planned campaign against Russian statehood and, in fact, betrayal of national interests, while a State Duma member's duty is to defend the interests of his country and voters."