Deputy Foreign Minister: Russia will not return to the Council of Europe

The Council of Europe (CE) is no longer pursuing the goal of “achieving greater unity” of the European peoples, says Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko. According to him, Russia “does not make any sense to return” to the Council.

In an interview “Parliamentary newspaper” Mr. Grushko said that Western countries “do not disdain gross violations of international law” and deprive the representatives of the Russian Federation of “their basic powers.” He promised that Moscow “will not put up with such arbitrariness.”

“The Council of Europe, as written in the first chapter of its charter, was created to “achieve a greater unity” of the European peoples. Through the efforts of the West, it has now been turned into something opposite. There is no point in returning to such an organization, a kind of waiting room of the European Union, even with a riot of fantasy,” the diplomat is sure.

On March 15, 2022, Russia began the process of withdrawing from the Council of Europe. On the same day, the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe approved a resolution expelling Russia from the organization. In November, President Vladimir Putin freed Ivan Soltanovsky from the post of Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the Council of Europe, since the Russian Permanent Mission to the organization in Strasbourg has ceased its work. Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe accepted resolution on the recognition of the political regime in the Russian Federation as “terrorist”.

Laura Keffer