MOSCOW, December 10. /TASS/. Russia should take full-fledged part in the work of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), its ungrounded suspension is inadmissible, Filippo Lombardi, Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Council of States (upper house) of the Swiss Parliament, said on Monday.
"Indeed, there is a range of problems in this connection and I am personally involved in their resolution. I think that Russia should continue to take part in the activities of the Council of Europe and its Parliamentary Assembly. The situation when Russia is excluded from these activities without any reasonable grounds is unadmissible," he said at a meeting with speaker of Russia’s Federation Council upper parliament house Yuri Vorobyov.
In a period of growing tensions in the world, Russia and Switzerland should not only develop bilateral ties but also consolidate efforts within international organizations, he said. He highly appraised cooperation between the two countries in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). "It continues to be very close and productive," he noted.
Vorobyov, in turn, stressed that Russia’s delegation can be back in the PACE "only after its full-fledged membership is reinstated."
Russia and PACE
The Russian delegation to PACE was stripped of key rights, including the right to vote and take part in the assembly’s governing bodies in April 2014 following the developments in Ukraine and Crimea’s reunification with Russia. The issue of restoring the rights of the Russian delegation was raised at PACE twice throughout 2015 but the sanctions were only toughened. In response, Russia suspended its participation in the PACE activities and skipped PACE meetings in 2016-2018 due to the ongoing sanctions.