Russia May Boycott PACE Session

The speaker of Russia’s State Duma, Sergei Naryshkin, has decided not to travel to next week’s session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, where he was supposed to address PACE and answer questions from delegates. “We feel my strategic proposals are unlikely to receive a fair hearing from some PACE leaders and from some leaders of Russo-phobic delegations,” Naryshkin explained.  According to Russian media, the whole Russian delegation may boycott the session over the resolution on Russia which PACE is intending to adopt. The assembly is scheduled to examine the new report on Russia’s honoring of its PACE commitments. The report calls for continued monitoring of Russia’s commitments, citing the harsh sentences handed down to the all-female punk collective Pussy Riot and the slow pace of reform of the judicial system.  Welcoming some “very positive” steps by Russia, such as amendments to the law on political parties, changes in the electoral law and the re-introduction of direct elections of governors, the draft resolution says some other measures raise “serious concerns”. The de-legalisation of the Republican Party, the refusal to register some political parties, the systematic non-authorisation of peaceful demonstrations and the use of disproportionate force to disperse them, the creation of restrictive conditions for freedom of the media, especially the large and influential media, and harassment of the opposition, have all had negative effects on the state of democracy in Russia, according to the report.

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20120927/176255888.html
http://www.lenta.ru/news/2012/09/27/pase/
http://assembly.coe.int/ASP/NewsManager/EMB_NewsManagerView.asp?ID=7903