According to the principle of rotation: what changes have taken place in the Human Rights Council under the President of the Russian Federation

The new head of the Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society was the Secretary of the Public Chamber Valery Fadeev. The former head of the HRC, Mikhail Fedotov, was dismissed due to his 70-year-old age. The corresponding decree was signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“The Russian journalist, public figure and secretary of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation Valery Fadeev has been appointed presidential adviser and chairman of the Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights by decree of the head of state Vladimir Putin,” the HRC website says.

Evgeny Bobrov, who served as deputy chairman of the council, as well as lawyers Pavel Chikov, Igor Shablinsky and Ekaterina Shulman, were excluded from the organization.

According to the press secretary of Russian President Dmitry Peskov, personnel decisions are related to the need to rotate the composition of the HRC, TASS reports.

In addition, the head of the Human Rights Council Commission under the President of the Russian Federation on civic participation in legal reform, judge of the Constitutional Court Tamara Morshchakova announced the withdrawal from the HRC.

Fadeev himself said that he intends to hold a meeting before making the first decisions as the head of the HRC. For this purpose, the new head of the association will hold an organizational meeting.

“The chairman is not the boss of all these people, this is not an administrative structure. And the tonality, agenda, of course, is set by the members of the Council for the Development of Civil Society, as it is customary to omit this part, and by human rights. I plan to invite my colleagues to the organizational meeting, present them my vision and best practices and listen to them, ”RIA Novosti quoted him as saying.

He noted the importance of maintaining the results achieved by the previous leadership of the HRC. He also brought his vision of the work that the HRC should do. He noted the importance of combating inequality in various areas of human life.

“And this inequality is directly related to human rights. The Constitution gives us the right to decent work, decent pay, education, and so on. And this is in addition to political rights, which, of course, must be respected. Today, life is such that not everyone can satisfy their rights, ”said the new head of the HRC.

Fadeev was born in 1960 in Tashkent in the territory of the Uzbek SSR. In 1983 he graduated from the Faculty of Management and Applied Mathematics of the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology. From 1986 to 1992, he worked in various positions at the USSR Academy of Sciences, where he dealt with macroeconomics and energy. In the 1990s, Fadeev worked for Kommersant-Weekly, Expert and Izvestia.

Subsequently, he worked in the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation, and also broadcast several programs on Channel One, including the talk show “The Structure of the Moment”, as well as the Sunday issue of the program “Time”.

The organization emphasized that the HRC is an advisory body to the president, and he is free to make decisions on the rotation of board members. Fedotov’s work as head of the structure in the HRC itself was appreciated.

“Mikhail Alexandrovich was the leader of this structure for the longest time. There were, of course, as always, when people work, some kind of roughness. But I believe that this structure (under Fedotov. - RT ) has become more authoritative, ”RIA Novosti quoted Kirill Kabanov, member of the Human Rights Council and chairman of the standing anti-corruption commission.

According to him, the situation with the change of the head of the HRC is not unique.

“When Ella Alexandrovna (Pamfilova, who led the HRC from 2004 to 2010. - RT ) left, everyone was also in shock. Even board members, you remember, quit the board. But the work continued, therefore, I think that there is nothing unique in this, ”Kabanov concluded.

The Human Rights Council is an advisory body to the head of state, created in 2004 on the basis of the Commission on Human Rights under the President of the Russian Federation, which, in turn, was formed in 1993.

The organization’s tasks include facilitating the processes of humanization and modernization of Russian society, examining draft federal laws to determine their relevance to the development goals of civil society, and informing the president about the state of affairs in the field of human rights and freedoms. HRC decisions are advisory in nature to public authorities.

Appointment Vyshinsky

Along with these permutations, the executive director of MIA Russia Today Kirill Vyshinsky was included in the HRC. The journalist himself said that in the course of work in the organization he plans to deal with the rights of Russian journalists in other countries. According to him, big problems are noticeable in this direction, in particular, in Ukraine and the Baltic states.

“My colleagues in large numbers are not allowed into Ukraine, there are problems in the Baltic countries with our publications, with our journalists. They do not let them in, they expel them, they prohibit entry for a long time, they remove them from trains, put them on sanction lists and so on. I proceed only from the opportunity to be useful for some real business, for me it is not a question of posts, ”RIA Novosti quoted Vyshinsky as saying.

Recall that Vyshinsky was detained in May 2018 in Kiev. The head of RIA Novosti, Ukraine was accused of supporting the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk republics, as well as treason. Vyshinsky was placed under arrest and this measure of restraint was extended several times.

The journalist himself and his defense have repeatedly claimed that they consider the persecution to be political. In particular, he said that the initiator of the case was the ex-president of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko, who thus wanted to raise his political rating.

At the end of August 2019, the Court of Appeal released Vyshinsky from custody under personal guarantee. In early September, Vyshinsky arrived from Kiev to Moscow as part of an exchange of held persons between Ukraine and Russia. He admits that in Ukraine he will subsequently be convicted of "treason" for a term of up to 15 years.

“There is still a high probability, in any case, it is that I can be found guilty and convicted under article 111 of treason for a term of 12 to 15 years,” the journalist said.