Today.Az » Politics » Baku voices attitude towards Venice Commission’s statement
21 December 2011 [09:32] - Today.Az
Baku has announced the milestones, on which it disagrees with the
Venice Commission regarding the amendments to the Law on political
parties.
"During two round of discussions with the Venice Commission, both last
month and in recent talks, we submitted a general text of the Law on
political parties developed by Azerbaijan. According to our logic, the
law, which was adopted in 1992 and meets neither the Azerbaijani
Constitution's norms nor the subsequent political development, should be
more dynamic and be brought into line with today's requirements,"
Azerbaijani Presidential Administration Social and Political Department
Chief Ali Hasanov said.
He said at the same time amendments to the law ensue from the fact that
the Azerbaijani government has shown the will to finance political
parties from state budget.
"Azerbaijani government, like other developed countries, demonstrates
its desire to free political parties from external influences,
including foreign financial influence. In this case, of course, we are
not currently satisfied with funding political parties by foreign
countries or foreigners' membership in political parties. Therefore, we
initially stated that the standards considered appropriate by the Venice
Commission to the European Union cannot be considered appropriate for
other members of the Council of Europe. So far, none of these countries
has a law allowing foreign citizens to create and fund the political
parties, as well as struggle for power," Hasanov said.
He said Azerbaijan stated in advance that this norm is not
appropriate for Azerbaijan, and, regardless of the conclusions, the
country's parliament cannot accept such a law. Hasanov noted another issue discussed was about political parties that are against the constitutional order.
"And it became a serious topic of discussion between us and the
Venice Commission. The points we submitted state that if a political
party struggles to change the constitutional order by violent means,
then a question arises to close down the party, and it is closed and
liquidated as a political institution. The Venice Commission somewhat
hesitates on this issue and makes opinions about other forms of
struggling against the constitutional order. Of course, it openly says
that the question is about a violent activity of political parties,"
Hasanov said.
Another matter of dispute is that Azerbaijan considers that political
parties must unite gradually, there should be some consolidation among
them, and if they are funded by the state budget, the number of parties
should be adequate to the country's political life, he stressed.
"In this case we offered to increase the previous level at 1,000
people, which are among the criteria for establishing political parties,
up to 5,000. If any political party wants to become a real party, to
participate in the elections, to be financed by state, then the number
of its members must not be less than 5,000. Of course, the Venice
Commission considers that it may create some difficulties, but we
believe that it will not cause any problems. I have not heard that any
party states the number of its members is less than 5,000 people. Each
party believes that the number of its members is much more than 5,000
people, and so this issue will not create any problems for Azerbaijan,"
Hasanov said.
Another issue is associated with the procedure of suspending parties' activity, he underlined. "The question is about by whom and under what conditions political
party's activity may be suspended. We have defined a specific approach
to these questions in the amendments to the law: in what cases the
registration authority, that is, the Ministry of Justice, may initiate
the closing of political party. The Ministry of Justice is the body
registering political parties. But in any case, the court decides on
closing down the party. The court is an independent authority.
Therefore, no one can doubt about its independence. And in this issue,
we do not understand the remarks or recommendations made by the Venice
Commission to a certain extent," Hasanov said.
He said other issue that was discussed was associated with trade
union organization's attitude towards political parties, with their
participation in political processes.
"In this issue we have come to an agreed position that the trade
unions do not participate in politics generally, but each union can be a
member of a political party, may provide financial assistance to
political parties and participate in establishment of a political party. But on the whole trade union organizations are independent organization and are not involved in politics," Hasanov said.
/Trend/
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