A PUBLIC APPEAL BY YELENA BONNER

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Respected members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe -- I am turning to you with an unusual request. I call on you to assemble PACE in extraordinary session and to take a position on what has been happening with Andrei Babitsky. Andrei Babitsky was arrested by the Russian military or police and exchanged for two Russian soldiers. A civilian journalist fulfilling his professionalduties, he was, after three weeks of complete isolation, handed over in the absence of independent witnesses by representatives of the state into the hands of those whom this state considers to be terrorists and bandits. In taking this step, Russian officials andinstitutions declared that they no longer had anyresponsibility for his fate. The highest mission of PACE is the defense of human rights and of all international agreementsand conventions directed to that end. InBabitsky's case, many of these were violated bythe state. Therefore, I am turning to you with this appeal out of concern for the life of Andrei Babitsky, for the life of hundreds and perhaps even thousands of citizens of Chechnya who are held in the so-called filtration camps, and for those who may be put in these institutions in the future in the course of continuing military operations and the subsequent so-called cleansing of the population. In hope, Yelena Bonner