Russia adheres to the previous position regarding the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), this was again stated at a meeting with the delegation of France, said Leonid Slutsky, head of the State Duma’s International Affairs Committee. About this reports RIA “News.”
“We brought to our French friends that we remain at the same position regarding the PACE and the need to change its provisions, which refers to the possibility of revising the powers of national delegations formed by country parliaments,” said Slutsky.
According to him, during the French presidency of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe, “it is necessary to make every effort so that the very difficult problems existing today between the Committee of Ministers and the Parliamentary Assembly are resolved.”
In turn, the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the National Assembly of France, Mariel de Sarnez, said that it was necessary for “everyone to take a step towards another, everyone to make an effort to come to a compromise.”
The Russian delegation to PACE in April 2014 was deprived of the right to vote and of some significant powers due to the annexation of the Crimea and the situation in Ukraine. Since then, the sanctions have only tightened.
In 2016-2018, the Russian side did not send the documents necessary for the accreditation of delegations to the session and distributed this decision for 2019.
In the summer of 2017, Russia – one of the main contributors to the CE budget – suspended the payment of its contribution to the organization due to the non-participation of the delegation in the work of PACE. At the same time, the Russian side called for provisions to be included in the regulations of the assembly that no one has the right to deprive national delegations of authority.
Council of Europe Secretary General Thorbjørn Jagland in October 2018 recalled that if a country does not pay its dues within two years, it can be excluded from the organization. The term of Russia is suitable in the summer of 2019.
