GRYZLOV: TERRORISM PREVENTS RUSSIA FROM BANNING THE DEATH PENALTY

March 23, 2010: Russian State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov said Russia has refrained from ratifying Protocol 6 to the European Convention on Human Rights that covers the abolition of the death penalty due to terrorist threats.
"Certain circumstances do not allow us to do that [ratify the protocol abolishing the death penalty]. This issue has to do with terrorist activities in Russia," Gryzlov said in a meeting with Andreas Gross and Georgy Frunda, members of the PACE monitoring commission, in the State Duma.
Gryzlov reiterated that Russia has fulfilled most of the obligations it assumed when it joined the Council of Europe in 1996.
Gryzlov said Russia is ready to continue working on the appropriate report "although some other countries, which in our view are in a worse situation, have stopped monitoring and it is also an issue to be addressed in our meeting," Gryzlov told the PACE officials. (Sources: Interfax, 23/03/2010)