MOSCOW. Jan 30 (Interfax) - Russia's criminal legislation needs a separate article on torture, the country's human rights commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova said.
"I think that an article on 'Torture' has a right to exist. Foreign legislation has such a specialized article in its criminal code, such an article would act as an important preventive measure and could increase a measure of responsibility," Moskalkova told reporters on Tuesday.
The Federal Security Service (FSB) is right that the new article should be aligned with the existing legislation to avoid an overlap between laws, she said.
"Apparently, the FSB thinks it is necessary to work not so much with legislation as with the law-enforcement practice and the existing legal constructs should be used more effectively. But there is also another way: to introduce a stand-alone article and thus improve the law-enforcement practice," Moskalkova said.
On Tuesday the presidential council for human rights released feedbacks from government agencies on the recommendations issued at a special session on "Openness and legality: the main guarantees of respect for human dignity at criminal enforcement system institutions."
Introducing a new Criminal Code article qualifying torture as a case of official misconduct would be excessive because the Code already contains relevant articles, the FSB feedback said.
"Regarding clause 2.3 of the recommendations to introduce into the Russian Criminal Code a new qualification of the official crime of 'torture' - we consider it to be excessive because the relevant act may be qualified under Article 117(2)(d) (physical abuse with torture) or under Article 286(3)(a) (exceeding of authority with violence) of the Russian Criminal Code," the FSB said in a reply to the Human Rights Council recommendation after a special session, entitled "Openness and legality: the main guarantees of respect for human dignity at criminal enforcement system institutions."
The Interior Ministry also said that such a novelty was excessive.
A general ban on torture in Russia is contained in Article 21(2) of the Constitution, it said. "Despite the Criminal Code not containing a separate article imposing liability for torture, such acts may be qualified under separate articles of the Special Section of the Criminal Code, which fully conforms with the definition of the notion of 'torture' contained in Article 1 of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane, Degrading treatment or Punishment," the Interior Ministry said.
The proposal to add the torture article to the Criminal Code was made by the Council' head Mikhail Fedotov in September 2018. Currently the legislation does not impose liability for torture and such crimes are penalized under other articles such as "exceeding of authority," Fedotov said. In his view, such a situation violates the Russian constitution.