The first meeting of the Council on interethnic relations under the
Russian President will be held tomorrow in Saransk, Mordovia. The
press service of the Kremlin announced that on August 24 Russian President Vladimir
Putin will visit Saransk.
The Council on Interethnic Relations, established in accordance with
the presidential decree of June 5, 2012, aims to improve public policy
in the field of international relations and security cooperation
between the federal, regional and local authorities, NGOs, academia,
and other organizations on matters of international relations. It is
also proposed to introduce a special position of ombudsman for
ethnic relations. These questions should be discussed tomorrow.
Commenting on this issue to VK, Vladimir Lukin, human rights ombudsman
in Russia, said that "he can only welcome it if it contributes to the
normal legal and civilized development of our country. I do not know,
however, whether the establishment of an Ombudsman for ethnic
relations will be useful. I am afraid, or rather uncomfortable with
the fact that recently it has become fashionable to put forward ideas about
the creation of the next official in charge of something almost every week.
Vladimir Lukin allegorically deconstructed the idea of producing
more and more industry ombudsmen and expressed doubts about their
efficiency. He also recalled an anecdote about a man trying to hail
a cab on the street. "Are you a taxi? Do you need to go, or be
cheap?". "I personally prefer to go," the Ombudsman for Human Rights of the
Russian Federation concluded.
The emergence of such ideas, according to Lukin, "indicates a
significant weakness of our trade unions, because many of the problems
in industry should be solved by the trade unions."
