BRUSSELS, January 24, 2:10 /ITAR-TASS/. The Russian Foreign Ministry’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law, Konstantin Dolgov, holds that the EU does not really monitor the human rights situation within the Union and has no ways of dealing effectively with human rights violations. He stated this at a news conference in Brussels on Thursday.
Dolgov presented to journalists the Russian Foreign Ministry’s report on the human rights situation in the EU in 2013. He said no one in the European Union now has a mandate to ensure improvement of the human rights situation in individual countries of the Union, above all in the Baltic states, and this cannot but cause concern, particularly, as the EU presents itself as one of the main supporters of adherence to fundamental democratic values.
Dolgov noted the spread in Europe of xenophobia, nationalism, radicalization and discrimination, and, consequently, the population’s support for far-right parties. He said the Russian Foreign Ministry’s report is an invitation to comprehensive international cooperation, including with the participation of Russia and the European Union, toward improving the human rights situation.
Dolgov holds that the situation reflected in the report gives no moral right to the European Union to assume the role of an arbiter on the human rights situation in third countries.