Page 30 - RusRPTApr24

Chairman of the Constitutional Court Valery Zorkin himself said quite recently that this is impossible - in 2022 he said that in Russia a “constitutional and legal regime has emerged, within the framework of which citizens of the Russian Federation received the right not to be sentenced to death,” but the only way return the death penalty - adopt a new Constitution. Today, however, they refused to comment on the return of the death penalty to the Constitutional Court, since “in today’s situation, the issue may become the subject of consideration by the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation.”
The legal procedure for reintroducing the death penalty remains a matter of debate. One of the main authors of the Constitution, former Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Shakhrai, said that there is no need to change the basic law or even make a separate decision of the Constitutional Court for this. All the conditions provided for in Article 20 of the Constitution, which describes the death penalty, already exist in Russia, he believes.
The official point of view, at least for now, is not that. Lawyer Sergei Badamshin on Monday described the constitutional procedure for returning the death penalty - and the head of the constitutional committee of the Federation Council, Andrei Klishas, publicly supported him. In order to apply an “exceptional measure of punishment,” it is necessary to change Article 20, Badamshin believes, and it is included in one of the fundamental chapters of the Constitution. By law, the Duma and the Federation Council cannot do this themselves - they can only convene a Constitutional Assembly, which must adopt a new fundamental law by approving it by two-thirds of the vote or submitting it to a national referendum.
However, lawyers interviewed by the publications “Vestka” and “We Can Explain” (recognized as foreign agents in Russia) note that the return of the death penalty is more of a political rather than a legal issue, so if there is a go-ahead from the Kremlin, Vyacheslav Volodin will be right.
What does all of this mean?
If the spirit and letter of the law are respected, then bringing the death penalty back on paper is a prohibitively difficult procedure. But, firstly, if they wish, nothing will prevent the Kremlin political managers from carrying it out, and secondly, ignoring the spirit and letter of the law, as Sergei Shakhrai proposes to do. The only question is Vladimir Putin's decision. But, as clearly follows from the position taken by Senator Klishas, he is not. Klishas is the Kremlin's chief constitutional law specialist, usually well aware of the position of the country's leadership. In 2020, he led the development of amendments to the Constitution to reset the terms of Vladimir Putin, and until now his position on high-profile proposals has always coincided with the position of the Kremlin.
What's in it for me?
If the death penalty does return, it will definitely be applied under articles of terrorism. And now this is almost a mass crime. In 2023, the number of terrorism cases tripled and reached the highest level since 2003, with the Ministry of Internal Affairs registering 410 cases. At the same time, even crimes that could be classified as hooliganism and as a result of which no one was injured are considered terrorist attacks. These include attempts by
30 RUSSIA Country Report April 2024 www.intellinews.com