The fate of missing persons and other human rights problems in the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya will be on the agenda when a representative of President Vladimir Putin reports to the Council of Europe this week.
The parliamentary assembly of the 41-nation human rights watchdog here suspended Moscow's voting rights last April because of its alleged rights record in Chechnya.
Vladimir Kalamanov, Putin's special representative for human rights in Chechnya, will appear before the Council on Wednesday and Thursday, a Council spokesman said.
Klamanov was expected to report on questions of missing persons, on restoring the legal system in the strife-torn republic, and on follow-ups to allegations of rights abuses collected by Klamanov's department.
The Russian official was scheduled to meet Council of Europe Secretary-General Walter Schwimmer and appear before the Council's executive body, the ministerial committee.
The results of a mission to Chechya by three Council of Europe experts attached to Kalamanov's rights bureau will also be presented this week.
Late last month, a Council of Europe delegation returned from a fact-finding mission deploring the unsatisfactory conditions facing refugees who had fled the war in Chechnya.
Chechen refugees were living in inhumane conditions in railway carriages parked near the Ingushetia border, a delegation member said.
In January, the Council's parliamentary assembly will debate whether to return voting rights to Russia on the basis of a report by two Council members scheduled to visit Moscow later this week.
When it suspended Moscow's voting rights in April, the parliamentary assembly called on the ministerial council to suspend Russia. However, in a diplomatic coup for Russia, the ministers ignored the call and refused to blackball Moscow.
The head of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) last month condemned the continued loss of life in Chechnya caused by Russia's clampdown there and demanded an urgent legal probe of alleged atrocities -- STRASBOURG (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
