On June 19 at its meeting, the Council of the State Duma will consider filing an application for participation in the regular session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and approve the composition of the delegation, Chairman of the State Duma Viacheslav Volodin
Vyacheslav Victorovich
The Chairman of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation of the eighth convocation. Elected in single mandate constituency № 163 (Saratov constituency - Saratov Oblast)
told reporters.
“The Council of the State Duma will make an official decision on the 19th,” he said.
According to the Chairman of the State Duma, the Council will discuss the issue of applying for the Russian delegation to participate in the PACE session, as well as “approving the composition of the delegation and its head.”
Viacheslav Volodin specified that the delegation consists of seven representatives of the Federation Council and 11 members of the State Duma. It is planned that the delegation will be headed by Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Petr Tolstoy
Petr Olegovich
.
Two scenarios
The Chairman of the State Duma also reported that two scenarios of further development are being considered.
“The first option is when on June 24 PACE adopts a resolution to exclude the possibility of restriction of the right of any delegation to vote, speak and take part in the work of PACE,” he said, reminding that this proposal was put forward by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (CMCE) on May 17 and then it was implemented in a report on the credentials of Petra De Sutter.
According to Viacheslav Volodin, if the Assembly entirely adopts this resolution, by the end of June 24, the Russian Federation will formally send its application for return to PACE.
“In this case, on June 25, our delegation enters the PACE meeting room,” he said. Viacheslav Volodin informed that on June 25 PACE will start reviewing the credentials of delegations. The Chairman of the State Duma did not rule out that “there will certainly be attempts to seize some credentials of the delegation of the Russian parliament,” for example, the right to participate in the governing bodies of PACE.
He also explained that if the credentials of the Russian delegation are confirmed without any exceptions, on June 26 the delegation of the Russian parliament will participate in the election of the Secretary General of the Council of Europe. This is a “positive scenario”.
At the same time, Viacheslav Volodin did not rule out an alternative scenario.
“When we, [Chairwoman of the Federation Council] Valentina Matvienko and I, sign an application to participate in the Parliamentary Assembly, we will certainly stipulate in this application that if our delegation is deprived of any credentials, we reserve the right to leave PACE,” said the Chairman of the State Duma.
He added that “if the credentials are not fully confirmed, in this case, the delegation of the Russian Federation will leave the meeting, and this will mean the termination of our work in PACE.”
