The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Europe's top human
rights watchdog, has decided not to send observers to Chechnya for a controversial
referendum scheduled for next month, Lord Judd said in an interview published
Monday.
Judd caused a stir last week when he announced that he would resign as the
PACE rapporteur on Chechnya if Russia refused to postpone the March 23 constitutional
referendum.
"Sending observers would mean acknowledging the legitimacy of a process that we
consider to be invalid at this stage," Judd told the Kommersant daily. The interview
appeared in Russian.
PACE President Peter Schieder downplayed Friday's decision not to send observers,
saying it was not final and could be reconsidered at upcoming sessions,
Interfax reported.
"No official motives for the decision were put forward," Federation Council Senator
Mikhail Margelov, a member of the Russian PACE delegation, was quoted as saying.
One apparent concern was security. In a resolution passed Wednesday, PACE called
on Russia to ensure "an adequate level of public security for all individuals
throughout the Chechen Republic before and during any referendum." But the resolution
stopped short of calling for a postponement, as Judd had recommended.
Russian officials were heartened by the text of the resolution and by Judd's decision
to step down, viewing them as a diplomatic victory. "He had long posed a real
problem for our interaction with PACE," Margelov told Interfax.
Central Election Commission head Alexander Veshnyakov said the resolution
and Judd's decision to resign show that PACE "is beginning to rid itself
of radicalism and double standards in assessing Russia's actions" in Chechnya.
State Duma Deputy Dmitry Rogozin announced Friday that he was stepping down
from his post as co-chairman of a PACE-Duma working group on Chechnya that
he and Judd headed together, in part so that Judd "could not be talked into" staying
on, Interfax said.
Rogozin said he would call for the working group to be disbanded at a PACE meeting
scheduled for Wednesday.