Speeches and Interviews of the Permanent Representative

STATEMENT BY MR. ALEXANDER LUKASHEVICH,
PERMANENT REPRESENTATIVE OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION,
AT THE 1349th MEETING OF THE OSCE PERMANENT COUNCIL

16 December 2021

In response to the report
by the Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions
and Human Rights, Matteo Mecacci

Mr. Mecacci,

This year, the OSCE executive structure headed by you celebrated its 30th anniversary – a good opportunity to look back, objectively assess the journey travelled so far and draw conclusions for the future. We share your wish to do the utmost to increase the trust of all the participating States. This is long overdue – especially in view of the lack of geographical and thematic balance in the activities of the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), its participation in dubious extrabudgetary projects, its aggressive promotion of a neoliberal agenda, its confrontational concepts and much else besides.

The shortcomings in the ODIHR’s work are clearly reflected in its statistics on hate crimes. With every passing year, these statistics, in spite of the OSCE commitments, increasingly resemble a compilation of violations of the rights of sexual minorities and members of pseudo-religious sects and cults. And this despite the fact that the task set by the OSCE Ministerial Council in Basel in 2014 to elaborate declarations on combating discrimination against Christians and Muslims has yet to be fulfilled. Nor have we seen the ODIHR produce a proper document on Christianophobia that is comparable to its relevant guides on anti‑Semitism and anti-Muslim crimes. We are counting on this deficiency to be rectified in 2022.

As is known, the participating States expressed, as long ago as 2006 at the OSCE Ministerial Council meeting in Brussels, their concern over “violent manifestations of extremism associated with racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, aggressive nationalism and neo-Nazism”. Fifteen years later, the aforementioned phenomena have not disappeared at all – on the contrary, they have intensified. At the Permanent Council meeting on 9 December, the Personal Representative of the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism, Rabbi Andrew Baker, spoke about how anti-Semitic incidents originated from “multiple sources”, which included right-wing and populist movements frequently associated with neo-Nazis and white supremacists. This confirms that the threat of neo-Nazism requires separate and careful consideration at the OSCE, not least when agreeing on the “package” and agendas of human dimension events, including the annual Human Dimension Implementation Meeting. We would remind you that this work should be carried out in accordance with the Rules of Procedure of the Organization and relevant decisions of the Ministerial Council and Permanent Council.

We share your concern about the impact of migration flows on the situation in the OSCE area. The causes of these are well known: they have to do with the destabilization of the Middle East and North Africa by the West. Egregious violations of the rights of migrants and refugees by one OSCE participating State were recently flagged by the European Court of Human Rights, which instructed that State to ensure minimum living standards and conditions for asylum seekers. It is completely unacceptable when border guards and military personnel use violence, stun grenades, smoke-puff charges and even chemical control agents against the civilian population, including children and women. Incidentally, the absence of a meaningful response from the ODIHR to these flagrant violations of human rights points to double standards.

You mention, in your report, that “times of crisis are opportunities to learn and develop further.” In that regard, we urge you to pay due attention to, inter alia, social and economic rights, the elimination of statelessness, preservation of historical and cultural heritage, children’s rights and the development of human contacts. A prompt reaction is required by the ODIHR and the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities to violations of linguistic and educational rights.

In general, as we have repeatedly stressed, the task of optimizing the whole human dimension of the OSCE is well overdue. Together with other like-minded countries, Russia has submitted relevant proposals on a number of occasions.

A few words now about the Office’s election observation activities. These make up one of the ODIHR’s main areas of work. It also continues to be the most deficient. We have drawn attention to major imbalances in the geographical distribution and scope of the missions, and also to the double standards to which the Office tends when describing the process and outcomes of elections in countries “east” and “west” of Vienna.

This year it did not prove possible to co-operate constructively with the ODIHR – even though we were willing to do so – when preparing and holding the elections to the State Duma owing to the Office having arbitrarily excluded itself from taking part in monitoring these. We hope that unacceptable situations of this kind will not occur henceforth. Draw your conclusions for the future. We should like to believe that our detailed statement on this topic at the Permanent Council on 5 August did not go unnoticed by you. In this respect, attempts to portray the ODIHR’s election monitoring methodology as “acclaimed” and “reliable” are clearly unjustified.

The only way to improve the situation and “strengthen the observation methodology”, as stipulated in particular by paragraph 13 of Brussels Ministerial Council Decision No. 19/06 on strengthening the effectiveness of the OSCE, is to develop agreed standards for election observation. Principles related to election monitoring approved by us all would facilitate the implementation of recommendations from reports and be conducive to more active co-operation by countries with the ODIHR in this area. Russia stands ready to support this in every possible way.

Incidentally, other aspects of paragraph 13 of the aforementioned Brussels Ministerial Council decision have not lost their relevance either, notably with regard to the importance of paying “utmost attention” to the “impartiality and professionalism of ODIHR’s election observation”, among other things.

We believe it is important to continue the practice of annual ODIHR seminars on election observation. These events constitute one of the few platforms for professional discussions on relevant issues related to election monitoring.

We take note of your plans to do your utmost to strengthen financially the institution headed by you. We believe that for this to happen it is necessary to fulfil just one condition, namely to finally take into account the observations and concerns that have accumulated among participating States with regard to serious deficiencies in the ODIHR’s programmatic and budgetary activities. We would welcome the initiation of a substantive discussion on this topic. Such a conversation is long overdue. Without this it is impossible in principle to talk about abandoning the practice of zero nominal growth in respect of the ODIHR’s financial and staffing demands under the Unified Budget. This applies above all to the “Elections” programme: the narrative of that programme and the methodology used to calculate its resource requirements need to be revised. The Office refuses to give a real justification for an increase in expenditure on election observation. The elections calendar for next year – which, incidentally, you drew up yourself – clearly indicates that the ODIHR’s budget proposal is excessive. You announced plans to deploy a “historic number” of election observation missions in 2022. Where to, if you don’t mind us asking? In such circumstances, the allocation of additional funds for monitoring would be a blatant violation of generally accepted principles of budgetary discipline. Even if other countries are prepared to turn a blind eye to such a violation, it is something that Russia cannot stomach.

We regret that certain States are blocking the discussion of problems related to the ODIHR’s programmes and budget. In this way they merely cause the situation to repeat itself every year whereby the Office’s requests for its funding to be increased do not attract consensus and the approval of the Unified Budget is held up.

In short, there is plenty of work for the ODIHR to get on with. In closing, we wish you, Mr. Mecacci, and the Office’s staff good health and success in activities that are in line with your mandate.

I thank you for your attention and request that the text of this statement be attached to the journal of today’s meeting of the Permanent Council.