Abkhazian president declared war on drugs

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SUKHUMI, January 21 (Itar-Tass) - Abkhazian President Sergei Bagapsh
has expressed his concern about drug addiction and road accidents in the
republic.
"These two evils have caused more deaths than the war," Bagapsh said
at a meeting with representatives of the socio-political youth movement
Young Abkhazia on Wednesday. The lives of 60% of young people who got in
road accidents could have been saved, had the drivers and the passengers
used safety belts.
Speaking about drug addiction, Bagapsh said that those who smuggled
drugs into Abkhazia would be sentenced to long prison terms "regardless of
the merits they may have to the Fatherland".
"The nephew of the president, a minister's son or anybody else;
everybody is equal in front of the law. Those who are guilty of spreading
drugs should be punished with the full force of the law. We shouldn't
reconcile ourselves to this evil and blame the difficulties of the postwar
period for everything," the Abkhazian president said.

.Medvedev to meet Council of Europe commissioner for human rights.

MOSCOW, January 21 (Itar-Tass) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev
will on Thursday meet the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights,
Thomas Hammarberg, who is staying in Russia on a working visit, the
Kremlin press service reports.
The recent ratification by the Russian State Duma of Protocol 14 of
the European Convention on Human Rights, which provides for reform of the
European Court for Human Rights, is expected to be a topic of discussion.
The Council of Europe has welcomed that decision. It has described it as
extremely vital.
Mr. Tornbjorn Jagland, the secretary general of the Council of Europe,
who met President Medvedev last December, said that the ratification would
apparently facilitate those reforms and that the Russian authorities could
rely on the Council of Europe's full support in this field.
In his earlier statements the Russian president used to say that
Russia, which is a responsible participant in all European processes and
Conventions, also deemed it necessary to improve the work of the European
Court for Human Rights.
Russia signed Protocol 14 but the Russian State Duma refused to ratify
it late in 2006. At that time the deputies considered that the protocol's
provisions were contradicting Russia's interests and the concept of
modernisation of the Russian judicial system.
However, as Medvedev said, consultations had been held and certain
solutions had been found last year.
"I wouldn't say that all these solutions are absolutely universal but
anyway these solutions have been reflected in official explanations of the
European Court's secretariat made in November 2009. The Committee of
Ministers of the Council of Europe passed a decision by consensus in
mid-December," Medvedev went on to say, having described the process as
"certain rapprochement of positions". On January 15, 2010 the Russian
State Duma ratified Protocol 14.
Human rights in Russia would be another vital subject which Dmitry
Medvedev and Thomas Hammarberg are expected to discuss. Mr. Hammarberg has
welcomed the intention of the Russian authorities to investigate a series
of high-profile crimes, including the circumstances of death of lawyer
Sergei Magnitsky.
Sergei Magnitsky, the lawyer of the Hermitage Capital Management
investment fund, died in a pre-trial detention facility on November 16
allegedly of cardiac insufficiency.
President Dmitry Medvedev ordered Russia's Chief Prosecutor Yuri
Chaika and Justice Minister Alexander Konovalov to investigate the
circumstances of Magnitsky's death.
Alexander Bastrykin, the head of the Investigative Committee of the
Russian Prosecutor General's Office, has recently briefed Thomas
Hammarberg on investigation into several criminal cases, including the
murders of the human rights campaigner, Natalya Estemirova, lawyer
Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasiya Baburova.
Bastrykin emphasized that the Investigative Committee was also
studying issues linked to mass burial grounds in Chechnya. At the end of
the meeting Bastrykin and Thomas Hammarberg agreed to develop effective
cooperation between the Investigative Committee and the Council of Europe
in the protection of human rights.
Thomas Hammarberg, who has been holding the post of human rights
commissioner since 2006, has visited Russia many times. His last visit was
in December 2009 when he attended commemorative events in memory of
Academician Andrei Sakharov.

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