Bargaining With PACE for Partial Return of Russian Credentials Unacceptable

Russia will resume its work in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) only when the country's delegation will see all its credentials returned without exception, speaker of the Russian lower house of parliament said.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Behind-the-scene hints at a possibility for Moscow to bargain with PACE for a partial return of the Russian delegation's credentials are unnacceptable, speaker of the lower house of parliament Sergey Naryshkin said Saturday.

Last week, Naryshkin said that Russia would not participate in the upcoming winter PACE session and would not present its credentials for renewal, but would continue its cooperation with the Council of Europe.

"I would like to reconfirm one more time that we will renew our activities on the venue of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe when Russia's delegation receives back all its credentials without exception," Naryshkin said in an interview with Sergey Brilev, host of the Vesti v Subbotu (Saturday News) show on Rossiya-1 television.

The April 2014 PACE resolution stripped Russian delegates of their voting rights and barred them from participating in PACE's three key bodies – the bureau, the presidential committee and the standing committee. The decision was renewed in April 2015, with a reconfirmation of Russian delegation's credentials slated for the winter session.