After the Declaration adopted on Friday 17 May in Helsinki by a Committee of Ministers (CM) seeking to find a solution to the crisis between Russia and the Council of Europe (CoE) (see EUROPE 12257/22), the ball is now in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE)'s court.
The PACE will have to find a scenario acceptable to all parties: on the one hand, Ukraine supported by the Baltic countries, Armenia, Georgia and the United Kingdom and, on the other, Russia, which denied PACE the right to suspend the voting rights of its delegation after Crimea's annexation in 2014.
This questioning of a sanctioning power already used by PACE in 2001 during the conflict in Chechnya underlies the whole issue and doubled the political crisis (Russia - PACE) from the beginning of an institutional crisis between the two statutory bodies of the Council of Europe, namely the CM and PACE.
The outcome, if any, will therefore require a rethinking of PACE's decision-making process concerning the credentials and voting of national delegations. This subject had already been the topic of a report by Petra De Sutter, Chair of the Committee on Rules of Procedure and Institutional Affairs. Debated in October 2018, this text had not been put to a vote at the time, as it was clear that it would not obtain the required majority (see EUROPE 12114/22).
The challenge now is to carry out this review requested by Russia and to do so before the election of the new CoE Secretary General scheduled for 25 June, on the second day of the PACE summer session (see EUROPE 12234/25). The Council of Ministers has indeed clearly expressed its wish to see all delegations - including Russia - participate in this vote.
Noting this official position, PACE President Liliane Maury Pasquier called on the two states concerned - Russia and Ukraine - to take "the necessary steps to make this happen" and announced that the subject would be discussed in the PACE Bureau on Thursday 23 May. She is in charge of presenting a scenario before the meeting of the Committee on Rules of Procedure, scheduled for 3 June in Paris.
The 'De Sutter' report could be re-submitted in this context. If necessary, it will then be put to the vote at the beginning of a June session, at which time Moscow would also have to present the credentials of a new delegation for ratification by the Chamber.
It is likely that these credentials will be challenged by countries opposed to Russia's reintegration, but this non-suspensive challenge will only be debated later in the week, i.e. after the election of the new Secretary General on Tuesday.
Nothing is therefore certain at this stage. However, Liliane Maury Pasquier appears determined. "I am convinced that we can achieve this if the political will is there," she said on Friday 17 May at the Helsinki meeting. (Original version in French by Véronique Leblanc)