The Belarusian parliamentary delegation took part in the summer session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg.
MPs Dmitry Shevtsov and Alena Anisim attended the sessions of the Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy and held a number of bilateral meetings, including a meeting with Head of the Directorate of Political Affairs of the Council of Europe Alexander Hessel. The parties discussed the state and prospects of cooperation between Belarus and the Council of Europe.
“They welcomed the considerable progress in bilateral relations achieved in recent years and declared their plans to intensify contacts in order to step up cooperation and deepen a constructive dialogue between Minsk and Strasbourg,” state-run news agency BelTA reports.
It should be noted that nearly all European states have acceded to the Council of Europe, with the exception of Belarus and the Vatican City,
As reported earlier, the PACE assembly in Strasbourg voted by 118 to 62 in favour of a motion to limit the sanctions mechanism that had stripped the Russian delegation of voting rights following a late-night debate on Monday.
In April 2014, after the Russian MPs’ welcoming for the annexation of Crimea and sparking the war in Donbas, the PACE decided to suspend the Russian delegation’s voting rights as well as the right of Russian members to be represented in the Assembly’s leading bodies and to participate in election observation missions.
