The European Union and the Russian government held their 17th round of human rights consultations in Brussels, allowing the EU to raise its growing concerns over the developments affecting human rights in Russia.
Both sides discussed at length the worrying situation of civil society in Russia, in particular the wave of restrictive legislations, the recent checks conducted on the basis of the "foreign agents" law and the ongoing court cases. In that context, the EU confirmed its intention to continue to follow closely developments affecting NGOs as a whole in that country, and expressed, among other things, its concerns at the fining of election monitoring organization GOLOS and at the charges brought against ADC Memorial in St. Petersburg.
Russia expressed openness in providing detailed clarification as to the implementation of that law and to pursue this dialogue in more depth on the basis of specific EU observations with the Ministry of Justice in Moscow, the European Council said in a press release.
The EU raised a number of specific human rights issues in Russia, enquired about the impact of Russia's efforts to fight torture and to foster the independence of the judiciary in the light of the recent visit of the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers.
The EU asked Russia to ensure that defense lawyers are able to work freely, in particular in the Northern Caucasus. The EU also called on Russia to refrain from adopting a federal legislation on "homosexual propaganda", which it believed could increase discrimination and violence against LGBTI individuals. Russia shared its concerns on the situation of non-citizens in the European Union and on the legislation regulating the use of minority languages in education systems.
The EU enquired about several ongoing judicial processes, including the posthumous prosecution ofSergei Magnitsky, the trial of Alexei Navalny and the situation of the people criminally charged relating to events on Bolotnaya square in May 2012.
The EU and Russia took the opportunity of the consultations to reaffirm the importance of the human rights system both at the U.N. and regional levels. They exchanged their views on the ongoing priorities and discussed ways to improve their understanding and cooperation in internationalfora (U.N. General Assembly and Human Rights Council; OSCE and Council of Europe).
Both sides noted the importance of taking into account recommendations and best practices of international human rights bodies and mechanisms on recent legislation and forthcoming initiatives was well. They expressed satisfaction at the conclusion of the negotiations of the EU accession to the European Convention on Human Rights.
Stepping up of cooperation at the bilateral or multilateral levels on issues such as gender, notably violence against women, violence against children or fight against corruption were considered promising. Practical cooperation could be sought on anti-discrimination issues.
In line with established practice and so as to incorporate the views of civil society into the consultations, the EU met representatives of Russian NGOs in Moscow and international NGOs in Brussels last month.
The next round of EU-Russia human rights consultations is due in fall 2013. The EU has restated its wish to hold the next round in Moscow, where it would benefit from the participation of relevant line ministries and agencies, as these consultations have so far only been organized in the European Union.
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