Russia will leave the PACE session in protest against deprivation of voice

The Russian delegation ahead of schedule leaves the April session PACE in protest against a significant restriction of its authority in the Assembly and reserves the right to consider the further participation in the organization’s activities, said the head of the delegation Alexei Pushkov, Interfax reports .

“We will not take part in the further work of the session. Now we are leaving this session in protest and reserve the right to consider the issue of the further participation of Russia in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, ”Pushkov said at a briefing on Thursday.

This is a gross violation of the rights of the delegation of the Russian Federation, he believes

"The majority in PACE betrayed the principles of the rule of law, the supremacy of human rights and the rule of law. The majority in PACE went along the path of servicing the political interests of the group of states that is aimed at the geopolitical development of Ukraine," the dipomat said.

However, Pushkov said that Russia would not rush with the decision regarding the appropriateness of the stay of the Russian delegation in the assembly. According to him, the delegation will still gather and discuss this issue.

Today, PACE members voted to expand the sanctions initially proposed in the draft resolution on the powers of the Russian delegation - it is not only losing until the end of the year of voting, but will not be able to work in the leading structures of the Assembly and participate in the election monitoring.

Most members of the Assembly at the plenary session on Thursday supported the amendment, which, in particular, reads: “... to express their condemnation and disapproval of the actions of the Russian Federation in relation to Ukraine, the Assembly decides to suspend the following rights of the delegation of the Russian Federation until the end of the session of 2014: the right to vote; the right to be submitted to the Assembly Bureau, the Presidential Committee, the Permanent Committee; The right to participate in the missions of observers in the elections. "

At the same time, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe rejected the amendment initiated by the representative of Georgia on the cancellation of the powers of the Russian delegation in the meeting.

Russia and PACE are experiencing the most acute crisis, the gap of all relations is extremely likely, earlier the chairman of the State Duma Committee on international affairs of Pushkov expressed an opinion.

“In the relationship of Russia and PACE - the most acute crisis in history. Now Russia is in an inch from tearing all relations with Pase, ”Twitter deputy wrote on Thursday.

In addition, Pushkov called the demand to deprive Russia of authority in the parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe by political extremism. This is “the path to the Cold War, by the end of the pan -European parliamentary dialogue,” Pushkov wrote.