PACE, Russia's State Duma deputies meet in Prague to talk on ChechnyaA two-day meeting of the special working group of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and the State Duma of the Russian Federation started on Thursday on the premises of the Senate of the Czech Republic, with a discussion about the launch of tackling the conflict in Chechnya by political means on the agenda.
Despite a virtual information embargo before the meeting, Prague Watchdog had found out that representatives of the pro-Moscow Chechens as well as of the Chechen resistance movement were invited to take part in the meeting.
During the Thursday meeting the members of the working group heard statements of a representative of the head of the pro-Russian Chechen administration Akhmad Kadyrov, an envoy of the Chechen president Aslan Maskhadov, and an unnamed person from the academic circles, Prague Watchdog was informed by one of the direct participants in the meeting. Regarding the complexity of the conflict in Chechnya, the aim of the meeting was “only” to hear the standpoints of all parties involved in order to reach to a starting point for launching talks leading to a political solution to the conflict, the same source told Prague Watchdog, adding that in this respect the meeting was a success.
The special working group was established after PACE’s part-session in January 2001 and should serve “as a forum for co-operation between PACE and the State Duma“ and provide support to the State Duma deputies in exerting influence on the authorities in Russia.
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