Italy Delegation to Submit Letter Condemning Excluding Russia from OSCE PA

The Italian delegation will deliver a letter condemning the exclusion of Russia from a dialogue within the annual session of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Parliamentary Assembly (PA) in Helsinki to the OSCE PA President on Thursday, Claudio D'Amico from Italy’s еurosceptic Lega Nord Party told Sputnik.

HELSINKI (Sputnik), Svetlana Alexandrova — According to the Italian lawmaker, members of his party started the initiative by collecting signatures of other OSCE PA delegates. Within one day they were able to collect 55 signatures.

"It was not that hard," D’Amico said adding that he "spoke with the heads of delegations" explaining to them the "importance and meaning of this initiative, and a lot of them have signed."

He informed Sputnik that all members of the Italian delegation, as well as the heads of the Austrian, Swiss, German, Belarusian and Malta delegations supported the initiative.

In their letter to the OSCE PA President, Finnish parliamentarian Ilkka Kanerva, the delegates "expressed a regret about the fact that it was not possible for the Russian delegation to participate in the general session of OSCE PA." It is against the spirit of Helsinki to exclude elected parliamentarians from an important ongoing dialogue, the letter stressed.

Earlier on Wednesday, Switzerland, Armenia and France refrained from voting on a draft resolution condemning Russia's alleged actions in Ukraine at the OSCE PA.

The two countries had put forward a draft resolution that condemned Russia's alleged violations of Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity since early 2014. Moscow has repeatedly denied these allegations. The resolution was passed by 96 to 7 votes, with 32 abstentions.

The resolution will now be included as an annex to the Helsinki Declaration, the final outcome document of the 2015 Annual Session. This Declaration will be adopted on Thursday during a concluding plenary session and will contain wide-ranging policy recommendations for the OSCE and its 57 participating states in the fields of political affairs and security, economics and human rights.