Strasbourg, 21 January 2017. The Co-rapporteurs of the Monitoring Committee for the Russian Federation, Ms Theodora Bakoyannis, (Greece, EPP/CD) and Ms Liliane Maury Pasquier (Switzerland, SOC ) and the rapporteur of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights for the implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), Mr Pierre-Yves Le Borgn’ (France, SOC), expressed their deep concern with the decision of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation that the payment of compensation to YUKOS shareholders ordered by the ECtHR in its 2014 judgment OAO Neftyanaya Kompaniya YUKOS v. Russia would violate the Russian Federation’s Constitution and therefore should not be enforced.
In this context the three rapporteurs reiterated that the full implementation of the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights is a legal commitment to which the Russian Federation has subscribed under the European Convention on Human Rights.
“Unconditionally honouring the Convention is an obligation incumbent on all member States and it is therefore unacceptable that Russia would not enforce a judgment of the European Court of Human Rights. The Russian authorities should therefore consider implementing the recommendation of the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe that the authorities consider revising the constitutional provisions at odds with the implementation of the ECtHR judgment. One cannot accept a selective implementation of the ECtHR’s judgments. We therefore hope that the State Duma and Council of the Russian Federation will consider amending the Constitution in order to allow for the implementation of all judgments of the ECtHR”, stressed the three rapporteurs.
