Representatives of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) will not be able to monitor elections to the Russian State Duma in 2016, the head of the Russian State Duma Committee for Foreign Affairs, Alexei Pushkov, said at a press conference.
He explained that the absence of the Russian delegation in PACE means not only physical absence. "All forms of cooperation that existed between Russia and PACE [preparation of reports by PACE on the Russian territory, visits by representatives and members of monitoring missions, our contacts with PACE’s official representatives] everything is cancelled," TASS cited him as saying.
Therefore, PACE will not be able to monitor elections to the State Duma, he concluded.
