MOSCOW, March 21. /TASS/. Moscow decided to withdraw from the Group of States against Corruption (GRECO) in order to escape discrimination, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Oleg Syromolotov said in an interview with TASS.

He pointed out that in March 2022, the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers had passed a resolution terminating Russia’s GRECO membership with the exception of the group’s monitoring of Moscow’s fulfillment of its obligations. "This means that Russia was stripped of its right to take part in discussions of country reports and the right to vote. That said, it is turning from a subject of monitoring into an object of monitoring. In order to prevent a discriminatory attitude towards our country, a decision was made to denounce the convention and fully withdraw from GRECO, depriving it of the legal basis to make assessments about Russia," the senior diplomat said.

Syromolotov noted that Russia, who had been a GRECO member since 2006, had always faithfully fulfilled its obligations.

On February 28, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law denouncing the Council of Europe’s Criminal Law Convention on Corruption. According to explanatory notes, the Council of Europe's Committee of Ministers previously decided to terminate Russia’s membership of the Group of States against Corruption with the exception of cases of GRECO monitoring the country’s implementation of its obligations under the convention. Russia was denied the right to take part in the discussion of reports as well as the right to vote. The document’s authors said that since such a situation was unacceptable for Russia, a decision had been made to denounce the convention and leave the organization.