When participating in the Council of Europe Russia traditionally strives to sustain the consensus approach which has been developed during the decades of the Organisation’s functioning. It consists in the fact that all the member-states make maximum efforts to reach compromise which integrates the positions of all the countries and to adopt decisions in the Committee of Ministers without voting. Russia belongs to six major donors of the budget of the Council of Europe along with France, Germany, Italy, Turkey and the UK. The contribution of the Russian Federation to the regular budget of the Council of Europe was 30 149 465, 77 Euro in 2016. As a major donor Russia enjoys some advantages.

The Council of Europe provides a unique opportunity for sharing best practices and achievements within its competence.

Russia views the Council of Europe as a unique mechanism of sectoral cooperation in the continent. It stands for strengthening the role of the Council of Europe as one of the most respected and representative regional organisations. The Council of Europe is using its conventions to promote the development of a common European cultural and legal space in Greater Europe and to strengthen democratic values, human rights protection mechanisms and the rule of law. The Council of Europe is also facilitating the intercultural dialogue, including its religious dimension.

Relations of the Russian governmental bodies with the Council of Europe are based on the Foreign Policy Concept approved on November 30, 2016. It says that Russia will continue its work within the Council of Europe as an independent universal European organisation with a mandate to provide for a single legal and humanitarian space on the continent through its unique convention mechanisms.

Russia’s primary efforts are concentrated on strengthening the role of the Council of Europe as a sustainable European organization aimed at engaging European states into diversified cooperation to elaborate common standards of democracy, rule-of-law state and respect for human rights.

Russia is committed to setting a unifying agenda for Europe. Together with other European states Russia seeks to address such challenges as terrorism, uncontrolled migration, drug trafficking, extremism, nationalism and Neo-Nazism which are on their rise in some European countries, statelessness, intolerance and discrimination on ethnic, religious, cultural and other grounds.