We are on Mount Strasbourgui

Russian membership in the European Court of Human Rights may be suspended due to non-payment of contributions, Izvestia reports . Moscow intends to freeze payments to the European Council in connection with the deprivation of the Russian delegation of authority in the parliamentary assembly.

“Talking about freezing membership in the ECHR and termination of payments is still premature, but the probability of this is increasing every day,” the source of the publication in the Federation Council said. “This issue has been discussed and discussed, and it is expected that the final decision will be made on October 27, when they consider the draft budget.”

Contributions to the Council of Europe are indivisible, to pay only in PACE or only in the ECHR it is technically impossible, explained to RIA Novosti the editor-in-chief of the scientific and analytical journal "Bulletin of the European Human Rights Court" Yuri Bereestnev. At the same time, he emphasized that it is impossible to participate in the ECHR and the recognition of his jurisdiction. “It is determined by the Federal Law on ratification of the European Convention on Human Rights and cannot be frozen,” Beresestnev said. “The convention can be denounced, but it is somehow strange due to the lack of deputy trips to Strasbourg.”

“You can, of course, simply not to pay a contribution to the organization, but if such a demarche still finds a limited understanding in the European capitals, which PACE also fed with its corruption scandals, no one will allow Russian deputies to swing to the ECHR - Russia will simply be expelled from the European Council for“ Sleeping Passing, ”Berestnev noted.

Meanwhile, during the visit of the Secretary General of the Seo, the Secretary of General of the Yagond in the Moscow, the restoration of the powers of the Russian delegation in PACE did not lead to success, although "now the situation is not so bad." This was stated by the official representative of the Secretary General Daniel Holtgen, TASS reports . “Now, in our opinion, it is not the time to build assumptions, but the time to continue the constructive dialogue in order to find the solution to the problem,” Holtgen said. “Now we need to solve the issue of Russia's participation in PACA. We need to be patient. We have time until the end of the year, there is time to hold other meetings and discussions between Russian colleagues and representatives of the parliamentary Assembly.”

On October 14, the State Duma speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said that Russia would refuse to execute the decision of the ECHR if the country does not participate in the choice of judges. "If we do not participate in the elections of the judges of the ECHR, the court decisions will not apply to us, since there is no legitimacy of the court, based on the fact that we were not allowed to form this court," said Volodin.

At the same time, the State Duma speaker emphasized that Russia does not intend to “slam the door” in PACA. It is this structure that forms the composition of the ECHR. "We just declared our position, stopped paying contributions and expressed an opinion on the issue related to the formation of structures derived from PACE," said Volodin.

Prior to this, the speaker of the Federation Council Valentina Matvienkoy made a similar statement.

In April 2014, in response to the annexation of Crimea, she deprived the Russian delegation of the right of vote , as well as the right to participate in the meetings of its authorized bodies and in monitoring activities before the end of the year. In January 2016, after the next extension of the deadline for these restrictions, Russia refused to participate in the Assembly session .

In June of this year, Moscow suspended the payment of an annual membership fee in PACA until all powers are returned to the Russian delegation. However, on October 11, PACE approved a decision that allows Russia to return authority . The draft resolution was prepared by the Italian Michele Nicoletti, who is expected to be the chairman of PACE in 2018-2019. The Ukrainian delegation introduced a number of amendments, but almost all of them were rejected by a majority vote.