Strasbourg – AFP
Russia decided to leave the Council of Europe, accusing NATO and the European Union of making it a tool in the service of their “military, political and economic expansion to the east”, on the twentieth day of the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that “the notification of the withdrawal of the Russian Federation from the organization” was handed on Tuesday to the Secretary-General of the Council of Europe, Maria Pecevonich Boric.
Council of Europe spokesman Daniel Holtgen confirmed receipt of this notification.
The Council of Europe ensures respect for human rights on the continent. It was established in 1949. It includes almost all the countries of the continent (47 countries), including Russia since 1996, and Ukraine since 1995. Only Belarus, an ally of Moscow, is not a member of it.
“Those who force us to take this step will bear the full responsibility for the destruction of the common humanitarian and legal space on the continent, and the consequences for the Council of Europe, which without Russia will lose its status as a pan-European body,” the Russian Foreign Ministry added.
“As leaders of the Council of Europe, we have on several occasions expressed our strong condemnation of the Russian Federation’s aggression once morest Ukraine,” said a statement issued by Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio, President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Tine Cox, and Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Maria Piccivonić Poreć.
“The ministerial committee will also hold an extraordinary meeting, in light of the notification by the Russian Foreign Minister today of the decision of the Russian leadership to withdraw from the Council of Europe,” the statement added.
A major implication of this withdrawal is that the 145 million Russian citizens will not benefit from the protection of the European Court of Human Rights, the judicial arm of the Council of Europe and of last resort, once morest any decisions of their country’s courts.
The Russian Foreign Ministry accused the institutions of the Council of Europe, including the court, of being “used systematically to exert pressure on Russia and interfere in its internal affairs.”
