On June 25, 118 delegates to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, or PACE, let their masks slip, revealing their real faces and true allegiances. Instead of supporting European values, human rights and the rule of law, they backed the Kremlin’s desire to have Russia’s unrestricted membership and voting rights at the assembly restored. The reasons for those voting rights being taken away remain completely unchanged and Russia still behaves like a gangster on the global stage.
Russia’s full reinstatement to the assembly is an unconditional surrender to dictator Vladimir Putin, exposing European weakness and disunity. Lawmakers, driven by self-interest, have forgotten whatever values they claimed to adhere to, rolling over and showing their bellies to the Kremlin.
Delegates from France, Italy, Spain, Ireland, Norway, Portugal, and Turkey unanimously supported Russia. A majority of delegates from Germany, Austria, Slovakia the Netherlands, Switzerland and Finland also supported the motion.
Only 62 delegates, including Ukrainians, voted against the motion. To their credit, delegates from the United Kingdom, Georgia, Poland, Sweden and the Baltic states put up a valiant but unsuccessful fight. Ten representatives in attendance did not bother to vote.
PACE shaped the European Convention on Human Rights, has crusaded against torture and the death penalty, oversees the European Court of Human Rights and is mandated to uphold democratic standards of its 47 member states. It is supposed to be a beacon of European virtue and values. Today however, it is a morally bankrupt embarrassment to Europe
Russia crusades against the core values of PACE, and openly moves to dismantle European democracy. Russia is also responsible for shooting down civilian airliners, waging bloody wars on Ukraine and Syria, illegally occupying foreign territory, undermining elections and deploying chemical weapons. Repressing the media, killing journalists, and torture can also be added to the Kremlin’s lengthy rap sheet.
Ilya Ponomarev, a former Russian member of parliament now living in Ukraine, got it right in describing PACE. “Previously, this organization had the status of useless, but highly moral. Now it is useless and immoral,” he said.
