The Secretary General of the 47-nation Council of Europe, Thorbjørn Jagland, today made the following statement in reaction to the Russian Supreme Court judgment concerning Ildar Dadin:
“I welcome the decision from the Russian Supreme Court to overturn the guilty verdict against opposition activist Ildar Dadin and to order his release.
“Freedom of assembly is fundamental to democracy and is protected by the European Convention on Human Rights.
“The Supreme Court ruling is based on an earlier judgment from the Russian Constitutional Court which rightly said that repeated violations of rules on public gatherings should not be seen as a criminal offence.
“I call upon the Russian Federation to rapidly change its legislation on public gatherings, in line with necessary changes set out by the Constitutional Court and the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.”
