On June 20, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had a meeting with Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjørn Jagland who came to the Russian Federation on a working visit.
The participants reaffirmed their commitment to preserving and strengthening the Council of Europe as an independent, universal pan-European organisation with unique convention mechanisms that ensure a unified legal and humanitarian space across the continent.
Sergey Lavrov stressed that additional efforts were needed to overcome the system-wide crisis the organisation was facing in order to preserve its pan-European nature.
The Russian official also drew the attention of the Secretary General to the need to be more proactive in using specialised mechanisms available to the Council of Europe in protecting ethnic minorities’ rights in member countries, primarily in Ukraine and the Baltic states.
In addition to this, the participants also praised the informal meeting of the ministers of sports, organised jointly with the Council of Europe that took place on the opening day of the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
