PACE Resolution: from runarounds to constructive results

On January 18 the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Presidential Committee delegation came to Moscow. At the meetings with the representatives of Russia the parties discussed implementation of the resolution on situation around South Ossetia adopted last autumn.

The PACE delegates led by Lluís Maria de Puig met the Speaker of the State Duma Boris Gryzlov, the Chairman of the Council of the Federation Sergey Mironov, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov.

The head of the mission Lluís Maria de Puig expressed his satisfaction with the result of the negotiations and the information he had received on the August events in South Ossetia. "We were provided with a lot of information and political evaluations that we had not known before" - de Puig stated talking to ITAR-TASS observer. He also ascertained that the PACE new resolution would take into account the conclusions made after the Moscow visit. "For the time being the whole resolution is a vague draft however there are no mandatory phrases concerning appeals to Russia to reject its recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia", - the head of the PACE summed up.

Konstantin Kosachev, the chairman of the State Duma Committee on international affairs, pointed out that the dialogue had become constructive and substantial. We have eventually started this dialogue, - Kosachev's words are quoted by ITAR-TASS - and if the new resolution keeps within this tonality, it is not impossible that Russia will adopt it".

It will be remembered that on October 3 2008 PACE adopted Resolution on "The consequences of the war between Georgia and Russia". According to this document it was Georgia to bring on the use of armed force in South Ossetia violating the international law norms. However the document reaffirms the Assembly's attachment to the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Georgia and calls on Russia to withdraw its recognition of the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Then the Russian party refused to accept this clause. Besides the resolution suggested that the parties should agree to an independent international investigation of the conflict.

Immediately after that Luk Van den Brande and Matias Eörsi representing the organization went to the region. On December 22 at the visiting session of the PACE committee on monitoring of the EC member states commitments in Paris they came forward with their report. In particular it was mentioned there that Russia had not complied with a significant number of the Assembly's fundamental demands while Georgia "had complied with most but not all of them". The mass media did not report what demands were meant.

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