Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and its parliamentary assembly
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- See Doc. 7791, report of the Political Affairs Committee, rapporteur: Mr Atkinson. Text adopted by the Standing Committee, acting on behalf of the Assembly, on 28 May 1997.
- Thesaurus
1. The Assembly welcomes the consolidation of the institutions of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and its interparliamentary assembly, now in their sixth year of activity.
2. The Assembly recognises the contribution which the CIS is making to stability and security in the European region and in central Asia.
3. The Assembly considers that the CIS provides a valuable framework for setting the bilateral relations of twelve countries of the former Soviet Union in a balanced, coherent, multilateral perspective:
3.1 ssential economic and cultural links between these countries are being preserved;
3.2 opportunities have been generated for comparing international policies and draft laws for transition to market economies and modern democracies;
3.3 a forum has been created for the expression, on an equal footing and respecting the national sovereignty of each of its member states, on questions of security and foreign policy and interregional relations which are of vital interest to the whole of Europe and throughout the area of the OSCE;
4. The Assembly welcomes the peacekeeping initiatives of the CIS, most notably in Georgia and Tadjikistan, as well as efforts of the CIS interparliamentary assembly to contribute to the peaceful settlement of regional conflicts in some countries of the CIS, in particular Transnistria (Moldova) and Nagorno-Karabakh (Azerbaijan).
5. The Assembly calls for enhanced co-operation between the Council of Europe and the CIS in regard to human rights, on the basis that there can be no interposition of CIS procedures or institutions between the national judicial systems of member states and the European Convention on Human Rights.
6. The Assembly considers that the Council of Europe should provide expert opinions on CIS model laws, if so requested.
7. The Assembly resolves:
7.1 to promote and provide for enhanced co-operation with the CIS interparliamentary assembly through the sharing of information and documents, exchange visits, joint hearings and seminars on subjects of common concern to their committees, through standing invitations to each other’s plenary sessions and by providing training programmes for CIS staff officials;
7.2 to instruct the Bureau to examine the modalities for inviting the CIS interparliamentary assembly representatives to its plenary sessions.
