Freedom of Assembly in Opinions and Reports of Venice Commission and Russian Legislation

Abstract

The paper is devoted to the consideration in the Russian constitutional legislation of the legal stances of the European Commission for Democracy through Law» (Venice Commission) in the field of freedom of peaceful assembly. Freedom of peaceful assembly is closely associated with political struggle, relationship between civil society and the authorities. It is fixed at the constitutional level and therefore is a sensitive topic in law enforcement practice and relevant in special scientific research, of which there are currently a small number in Russian and foreign science of constitutional law. Therefore, this article, as applied to the Russian Federation, aims to complete this gap. The implementation of the research tasks was achieved on the basis of the analysis of the Guidelines of the Venice Commission on Consolidation of Freedom of Peaceful Assembly in the legislation of European states. The author used the following research methods: comparative legal, logical, institutional, formal legal, comparative legal. The paper examines the legal principles of the Venice Commission on Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and the extent to which they are taken into account in the constitutional legislation of the Russian Federation. The conclusion is made about the narrow understanding of freedom of peaceful assembly reflected in the wording «the right to assemble peacefully without weapons». In this regard, the Federal Law on Assemblies is devoted not to freedom of peaceful assembly but to the right to assemble peacefully, which may be restricted by the State to a greater extent than freedom of peaceful assembly. This created the basis for a positivist regulation of freedom of peaceful assembly with broad powers of public authorities and the possibility of restricting the right to assemble peacefully, without weapons, while, according to the Venice Commission, the State should create adequate mechanisms and procedures to ensure that freedom of peaceful assembly is not subjected to excessive bureaucratic regulation. The Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation has largely adjusted Russian legislation on public events, bringing it closer to the legal standings developed by the Venice Commission.