Russian diplomats are tirelessly seeking ways to deprive the ODIHR of its ability to give independent assessments of poilitical processes in the former Soviet Union. In the photo: Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
Photo: Dmitry Azarov
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Expensive Displeasure
// Russia tries to cut off financing to the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights
Russia tries to take control of ODIHR
Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday harshly criticized the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, which he had accused of holding a double standard in relation to elections in the countries of the former Soviet Union. Russia has now gone from word to deed and is trying in discussions on the OSCE budget to cut the ODIHR's financing and make it subordinate to the OSCE Permanent Council. The United States and European Union oppose this, saying that such a reform would deprive the office of any purpose.
Budget Debate
OSCE press secretary Mikhail Evstafyev confirmed that hot debates over the budget are going on, telling Kommersant that “It's true. The budget still hasn't been passed. Within the OSCE there is disagreement, which, we hope, will be worked out in the coming months.”
There are battles over the budget almost annually and its financial documents are often approved only in the middle of the year, usually after all the members of the organization agree on money-saving steps. This year, Russia and the United States have competing proposals for economization. Russia is proposing to cut finding to the ODIHR, thus lowering membership fees. The Russian OSCE representative office in Vienna confirmed that Russia had a proposal, but declined to specify that it concerned the ODIHR, noting that “in the heat of the budget discussion, it is inexpedient to disclose its elements to the press.”
The Russian Foreign Ministry was more direct. Sergey Ryabkov, director of the ministry's department of European cooperation, told Kommersant that Russia was proposing to cut ODIHR funding “as part of a discussion on changing the budget scale.”
The U.S. is also proposing budget cuts. Washington would prefer to save money on the organization's secretariat, which was allocated ˆ29.5 million in 2006. The ODIHR received ˆ13 million the same year. A source in the ISCE says Russia opposes the American proposal, saying that the secretariat operates effectively. “The Russian delegation is saying that the secretariat cannot be weakened. If someone should be cut off from funds, it should be the DIHR, because it has become too independent, in their opinion. Washington, of course, is against that,” the source said.
Political Rumblings
Moscow is hardly bothering to hide the fact that its attempt to de-fund the ODIHR is more a political than economic step. After a conflict with office before last year's State Duma elections and, especially, after the ODIHR refused to send observers to the March presidential elections in Russia, Russian authorities have been openly hostile to it. Russian President Vladimir Putin did not mince words at yesterday's press conference in the Kremlin, saying that “the time is long due for a reform of the OSCE.” There is a plan ready for it as well. “When we say reform,” Ryabkov explained, “we mean three things: confirmation of the organization's charter, reform of the ODIHR and all systems of voting observation and bringing order to the participation of nongovernmental organizations in the activities of the OSCE.” Ryabkov stated that those steps were necessary because the OSCE now has “no legal bases for its activities.” A charter, Moscow says, could clearly define the role of collective organs in the OSCE, especially the ODIHR, which Moscow has not succeeded in reforming any other way.
In November, at the council of OSCE member state foreign ministers in Madrid, Russia, along with Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, proposed that the ODIHR be made full subordinate to the Permanent Council of the OSCE, which operates strictly by consensus.
The Russian proposal is specifically for the Permanent Council to determine the personnel of ODIHR missions, appoint their heads and, importantly, hear their accounts from their voting monitoring first and then decide whether or not to make those findings public. The U.S. and EU oppose these changes.
An OSCE source said that the Russian proposals were opposed because “They bureaucratized all the organization's procedures and would affect the independence of its institutions… The ODIHR reads its report the day after the elections take place now, but if the Permanent Council has the right to forbid it to do so, as Russia wants, the existence of the ODIHR looses all meaning.”
Different Outlooks
Russian and Western views differ on more than just the function of the ODIHR. They also differ on the participation of NGOs in the OSCE. Practically any NGO, except those whose activities have been declared illegal in international lists, have access to OSCE events. Russia has recent begun saying that there should be an accreditation mechanism for NGOs.
“Last year, a conflict arose because of that open access, when member of a Russian-Chechen friendship society that is banned in Russia appeared at an OSCE event,” Ryabkov recounted. “That was the last straw. We raised the question of an accreditation procedure. The main opponents of it were the U.S. and EU.” “Washington and Brussels said that the rights of NGOs shouldn't be limited so that someone decided who could come to the OSCE and who could not. It was declared that the building of a civic society and supervision of human rights were no less important than elections monitoring,” Kommersant was told in the OSCE secretariat. Moscow was not receptive to that point of view. “The problem is not with the Russian presidential elections, but with the fact that the U.S. and EU do not accept out call for reform,” said Ryabkov. “They tell us that the ODIHR is the gold standard' of elections monitoring, but we could say that the Interparliamentary Assembly of the CIS is the diamond standard!”
Vladimir Solovyev
All the Article in Russian as of Feb. 15, 2008
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