Law on ‘foreign agents’ for EU-Russia Summit?
European and Russian NGOs propose discussion of the law on ‘foreign
agents’ at EU-Russian summit
Around
90 leaders of civil society gathered in St Petersburg for a two day civil
society forum. The event was supported by the EU special representative for
human rights, Stavros Lambrinidis, and the chair of the Russian Federation’s
presidential council for the development of civil society and human rights,
Mikhail Fedotov. Mr Lambrinidis thinks that in a democratic society it is the
citizens who should be keeping a constant watch on the government and not the
other way round. Mr Fedotov shared his dream, which was that there should be
meetings at the Kremlin between representatives of the EU and Russia to discuss
issues concerning the relations between them.
The
representative of the German-Russian Exchange, Stefan Melle, said that NGOs
dealing with human rights work, protection of the environment, social themes
and the development of democracy participated in the forum. The recently
enacted law on ‘foreign agents’ will affect their work. In this connection, the
representative of the Centre for Civil Analysis and Independent Research,
Svetlana Makovetskaya, observed that members of the forum should find new and
creative ways of mobilising ordinary people in support of the values that they
hold dear. At the meeting it was proposed that the law on ‘foreign agents’ be
discussed at the forthcoming EU-Russia summit which is to take place in
December.
The
civil EU-Russia forum began work in March 2011 in Prague. It provides machinery
for continuous co-operation between civil society organisations from Russia and
the EU. The forum is aimed at strengthening the links between civil society
organisations; affording mutual assistance, maintaining solidarity and helping
the opinions of the public to be taken into account in the course of Russia-EU
dialogue.
Shtefan Melle e-mail: stefan.melle@austausch.org
; Elena Shakhova e-mail:
evshakhova@gmail.com
http://www.asi.org.ru/ASI3/rws_asi.nsf/va_WebPages/A0B619E96A7871F544257A93003AEC98Rus