On March 16, 2022, at an extraordinary meeting, the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe, in the context of the procedure initiated in accordance with Article 8 of the Charter of this international organization, decided that the Russian Federation would terminate its membership in the Council of Europe from that day.

The day before this decision, on March 15, 2022, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation submitted an application to the Secretary General of the Council of Europe on the voluntary withdrawal of the state from the organization, informing about the intention to denounce the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of 1950, in accordance with paragraph 1 of Article 58 of the Convention.

This statement was received by fax, in addition, the Secretary General of the Council of Europe was only informed of the “intention” to denounce the Convention. The procedure for the denunciation of any international treaty takes place, in particular, in accordance with Articles 65, 67 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties of 1969, as well as in accordance with the provisions of Article 58 of the Convention. It states: "

In case of receipt of a corresponding written notification of the denunciation of the Convention from the Russian Federation, the six-month period will be calculated from this day. If such a notification is not received, the participation of the Russian Federation in the Convention will be terminated with the beginning of a new financial year, namely: from January 1, 2023.

The consequences of the termination of the treaty are provided for in Article 70 of the Vienna Convention:.

" Unless the treaty otherwise provides, or unless the parties otherwise agree, termination of the treaty under its provisions or under this Convention:.

a) releases the parties to the treaty from any obligation to perform the treaty in the future;

b) does not affect the rights, obligations or legal position of the participants arising from the performance of the contract before its termination.

If a State denounces or withdraws from a multilateral treaty, paragraph 1 shall apply between that State and each of the other parties to the treaty from the date on which such denunciation or withdrawal takes effect."

This means that for all violations of the Convention until the end of the six-month period after the submission of a written communication of denunciation, the Russian Federation must be held accountable as a party to an international treaty. All violations of the Convention during this period fall under the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights, whose decisions must be enforced. We have no illusions about Russia, but we remember that the decision of the international court has been and will be a source of international law, even if there are fundamental changes in the international legal order after the war.

The general consequences of the exclusion of the Russian Federation from the Council of Europe for persons under the jurisdiction of the aggressor state are very disappointing and even terrible. Right to life, prohibition of torture, prohibition of slavery and forced labor, right to liberty and security of person, right to a fair trial, no punishment without law, right to respect for private and family life, freedom of opinion, conscience and religion, freedom of expression,. Just as he is losing hope in the development of democratic institutions and in free elections. It loses hope, because you can not lose what did not exist.

The human rights movement in the Russian Federation, as well as advocacy, are now devoid of content and meaning.. A huge regiment of diplomats and employees who worked in the institutions of the Council of Europe and the permanent representation of Russia to the Council of Europe will be fired, but are unlikely to want to return home.

Statements by Russian officials on the advisability of returning to the death penalty as a punishment for especially serious crimes is a very realistic scenario in the near future. In the absence of a fair trial and justice as such, this is a return to the inquisition.

Human life is an absolute value in Europe. The so-called fathers of the Convention drafted its text in post-World War II conditions to prevent the horrors of genocide and barbarism from ever again occurring.. By resorting to aggression, genocide of the Ukrainian people and frankly manipulating the facts in the text of the statement on secession from the Council of Europe, the Russian Federation demonstrated that it never shared these values.

Due to the exclusion of Russia from the Council of Europe, legal and political mechanisms of the Council of Europe cease to operate for persons under its jurisdiction. PACE monitoring visits and related reports, election observer missions, visits and reports of the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights and many other monitoring mechanisms are being stopped. After the decision of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe of February 25, 2022 to suspend the rights to represent the Russian Federation in two statutory bodies, its representation in all committees of the Council of Europe was suspended.

It is likely that, along with the Convention, there will be a long list of other Council of Europe treaties that Russia will wish to denounce, primarily those that provide for their own control mechanisms..

We are talking, for example, about the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture or Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment of 1987, since its control mechanism - the Committee of the same name and the mechanism of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights are complementary. Thus, the minimum standards of detention and proper treatment of convicts in the Russian Federation will disappear as concepts along with the termination of the inspections of the Committee.

The aggressor state has made its anti-civilizational choice and is constantly moving into the abyss.

During the 26 years of its membership in the Council of Europe, Russia has failed to ensure even the minimum standards of humanity, democracy and the rule of law, constantly blocking the execution of ECtHR judgments in favor of applicants and inventing national filters for their execution (as happened at the end of 2015, when.

Russia has long and repeatedly deserved to be excluded from the organization, in clear violation of Article 3 of the Charter of the Council of Europe. However, each time outweighed the motive to leave this international mechanism for the protection of human rights accessible to the population of the Russian Federation. However, the invasion of Ukraine was the last line.