At the 7th Forum of Regions of Belarus and Russia, CSTO PA Executive Secretary spoke about CSTO PA’s unique model legislation to counter the revival of Nazism

At the VII Forum of Regions of Belarus and Russia Sergei Pospelov, CSTO PA Executive Secretary, told about CSTO PA’s unique model legislation to counter the revival of Nazism in a presentation titled Historical Heritage of the Great Victory as a Basis for the Development of Socioeconomic and Spiritual Ties Between the Peoples of Belarus and Russia.
“The CSTO PA Parliamentary Assembly aims to further expanding model legislation and international cooperation to counteract the revival of Nazism,” said the CSTO PA Executive Secretary.
“This year, the peoples of the world have celebrated two significant and momentous events: the 75th anniversary of the Victory over Nazism and Hitler’s fascism in the Great Patriotic War and Second World War. The legacy of the 1945 Victory, the Potsdam Conference and the Nuremberg trials, as well as the establishment of the United Nations allowed to form a robust and effective system of international relations and law, which still warns the world against large-scale military actions, guaranteeing Europe its peaceful development,” he reminded.
He also recalled that the decisive contribution of the peoples of the Soviet Union to the Victory over Nazism is increasingly being belittled, despite the fact that “millions of citizens of the now allied states gave their lives, saving European countries from Nazi yoke and total annihilation. And we remember especially well that literally every family in Belarus has suffered an irreparable loss,” said the Executive Secretary.
Sergei Pospelov reminded that in April 2020, on the eve of the 75th Anniversary of the Victory, the heads of the CSTO Member States’ parliaments adopted an Address to the parliaments of the European countries urging them to increase efforts to outlaw the revival of Nazism and jointly oppose the spread of Nazism and its manifestations, using CSTO’s model-lawmaking experience in this sphere, among other things.
In particular, European parliaments were offered to work together to strengthen the ethical foundation of the system of international and regional security, as well as to prevent any attempts to justify the Nazis and their accomplices or actions of their followers, prevent alternative interpretation of decisions of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, their denial or distortion.
CSTO PA Executive Secretary gave a detailed review of the content of the Recommendations to Counteract the Revival of Nazism adopted by the CSTO Parliamentary Assembly:
– Recommendations on the Improvement of Legislative Support of Countering Crime on the Grounds of National, Racial and Religious Intolerance in the CSTO Member States (dated November 26, 2015);
– Recommendations on Improving the National Legislation of the CSTO Member States in the Area of Countering the Dissemination of Nazism and its Manifestations, which detailed legally significant characteristics of the manifestations of Nazism. Mr Pospelov also considered in detail the proposal to supplement the criminal codes of the CSTO Member States with the article Rehabilitation of Nazism.
Speaking about the possibility of CSTO Parliamentary Assembly’s continued counteraction of the revival of Nazism, Sergei Pospelov noted that this activity will be resumed under the 2021–2025 CSTO PA Action Plan on Approximation and Harmonization of National Legislation of the CSTO Member States, which is currently being drafted.
Future plans include work on model documents containing provisions on counteracting the Nazi danger, such as:
– CSTO Member States public security concept;
– recommendations on the development of common approaches of the CSTO Member States to design measures to counteract external destructive attempts to revise and distort the historical events and outcomes of the Great Patriotic War and the Second World War and methods of teaching their history;
– recommendations on the harmonization of the CSTO Member States’ legislation governing military training and patriotic education (with the development of a draft CSTO model law on military patriotic youth organizations);
– recommendations on harmonization of CSTO Member States’ criminal laws that penalize crimes against peace and security of humanity.
It should be recalled that on September 28 the Forum of Regions of Belarus and Russia was held remotely as a video conference because of the worsening coronavirus situation. Vyacheslav Timchenko, Chair of the Committee on the Rules of Procedure and Parliamentary Governance of the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, informed TASS about it.
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