Russia’s State Duma has passed a bill to withdraw from the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture, formally ending an international commitment to maintain human rights that has in any case almost completely ceased to have any effect in the country.
The move was proposed by President Vladimir Putin earlier this month, marking another symbolic step by Moscow away from international norms.
Although Russia has been a member of the convention since 1997, civil rights activists have always complained that torture and degrading treatment are widespread in Russian police stations and detention centers.
Formally, the convention allowed international monitors access to Russian prisons, but this effectively stopped following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
“In practice, tearing up this agreement will have no consequences,” Yevgeny Smirnov, a lawyer with Department One, a human rights group, told RFE/RL’s Current Time in August when the move was first discussed.
“Russia has already stopped implementing anything connected with [the convention]…in fact, no conventions that Russia has signed in previous decades are actually working,” he added.
Russia says that the Council of Europe has blocked its participation in Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and thus Moscow is unable to fully participate in the work of this monitoring mechanism.
Russia joined the Council of Europe in February 1996, but was suspended by the organization in February 2022, after launching its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Later it was expelled, although Moscow said it was withdrawing from the council.
The 1987 European Convention for the Prevention of Torture is a treaty of the Council of Europe. The council said that despite Russia's suspension, it remains a "party to the relevant Council of Europe conventions."
Ukrainian prisoners of war who have been released in exchanges have also reported torture in Russia.
“They have none of the guaranteed rights which Russian law (formally) provides for. They are not allowed to see human rights activists, observer missions, lawyers, or relatives. The convention wasn’t being observed and will continue to not be observed for these people,” said Smirnov.
