The Council of Europe Committee of Ministers once
again sharply criticized the Russian authorities for failing to implement the
recommendations of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in the case,
‘Alekseyev v. Russia’.
On 21 October 2010 Nikolay Alexeyev, a Russian LGBT
rights advocate, won a case before the European Court concerning prohibition of
2006, 2007 and 2008 Moscow Pride marches and picketings.
In the ‘Alekseyev v. Russia’, the court ruled that
Russia breached three articles of the European Convention of Human Rights, to
which it is signatory, including the right to freedom of assembly, the right to
effective legal remedy and the ban on discrimination. The court ordered Russia
to pay to Alekseyev nearly 30,000 euros in compensation.
The case marked the first ever international defeat
of the Russian government on the issue of gay rights.
The Russian government has paid compensation, but
continued to ban many public events of the LGBT community and thus not abiding
the judgement of the ECHR.
The Council of Europe is an international
organization promoting co-operation between all countries of Europe in the areas
of legal standards, human rights, democratic development, the rule of law and
cultural co-operation. All members states are signatory to the European
Convention of Human Rights which is legally upheld by the ECHR, which is the
judicial part of the council.
Due to this continued violation, the deputy foreign
ministers of the Council of Europe's Committee of Ministers (CECM) statement was published late on Friday (28 September) that the Russian
government has not fulfilled the ECHR’s ruling of lifting the ban on public
events by LGBT organisations as ruled.
Committee of Ministers noted ‘only a very limited
number of’ LGBT events were allowed to take place, while in the ‘vast majority
of cases’, Russian authorities, particularly in Moscow refused to grant permits
to them.
CECM also expressed ‘concerns as regards the use of
regional laws prohibiting propaganda of homosexuality’ being used to ban LGBT
events.
It addition observed that Russia needs to take
measures to train and raise awareness on LGBT issues for the authorities
responsible for issuing permits for public events, ‘and asked the Russian
authorities to submit a comprehensive action plan in this respect’.
CECM stated that current procedures in Russia are
inadequate to deal with the situation an ‘invited the Russian authorities to
adopt the necessary measures, through legislative action if need be.’
Finally the Committee of Ministers meet to discuss
the issue, at their first meeting in 2013, where they will also review the
action plan that the Russian authorities are due to submit.
Speaking with GSN Alexeyev said the 'The Council of
Europe is not satisfied at all with the contiual breach of ECHR's ruling by
Russia, and thus announced that it will closely monitor its actions.
'There are a few decisions of ECHR which are not
being abided by Russia, in terms of general legal position and the European
Convention.
'The more this case continues to be breached, the
more Russia has to answer, the more the Council becomes unsatisified, and the
more chances that Russia will eventually have to authorise gay pride.
Otherwise there can be a situation which will may
disqualify Russia’s membership at the Council of Europe, as its non
implementation of ECHR descion is a breach of international obligations.
'During Monday’s (1 October) session of the
parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe there will be a discussion of
the above resolution. There is a monitoring process which will be raised to the
level of CECM, this only happens when a country is found to have serious human
rights violations.
'I hope that following this case and many others
enough pressure can be brought on Russia to start allowing LGBT events.
'We don’t know how long this will take, it depends
on how harsh the CECM resolution would be, and how Russia responds to them.
'We have about 20 cases pending in ECHR related to
Russia banning LGBT events, only one was decided.
'Thus is also depends how fast ECHR will open these
other cases against the Russian authorities, as we need to show that the
question of these are consistent violations of the European conventions, and
thus an institutional problem.'
Aleksevy remains hopeful: 'we have many cases
pending, and ‘other LGBT Russian organizations are finally also joining appeals
to ECHR which will help. Others will also join in appeals, not only gay events
but for example opposition groups which are being banned the Russian
authorities, violating the European Convention’s article of freedom of
assembly.’
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