“As a member of the Dutch delegation I am not aware of such a resolution,” Tiny Kox, a Dutch senator from the Socialist Party and the Netherland’s delegate to PACE told Sputnik news agency Monday. “Perhaps one of the members is working on it, surely not the delegation as such.”
Earlier on Monday, Russia’s Izvestia daily newspaper reported that the Netherlands had prepared a draft resolution on debarring Russia from voting at PACE for one more year.
“Certain chiefs of PACE and the Assembly’s committees are currently in Kiev, trying to figure out what to do with the Russian delegation in January. However, the Ukrainians oppose even partial restoration of Russia’s rights. As a PACE member, I don’t think our rights will be reinstated," Izvestia quoted Russia’s senior lawmaker Leonid Kalashnikov as saying.
Another member of the Dutch PACE delegation, Mark Verheijen, also said that he had no information about the alleged resolution.
“I don't know anything about a resolution from 'The Netherlands' on this topic,” Verheijen, who is a member of the Dutch House of Representatives from the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy told Sputnik.
According to Izvestia, it is unclear whether the Netherlands' draft law would deprive Russia of its voting rights completely or partially.
In April 2014, PACE suspended the voting rights of the Moscow delegation following Crimea’s reunification with Russia in March, 2014, a move condemned as illegal by the West and Ukraine. Voting rights in the organization are renewed annually at the winter session.
