A European Parliament official on Tuesday blasted Russia over its failure to punish the killers of human rights activists.
Heidi Hautala, who heads the parliament's subcommittee on human rights, said in a statement that "the prevailing impunity toward the perpetrators" has been a "constant subject" in contacts with Russian authorities.
Hautala's statement was read aloud by her colleague Geoffrey Harris at a Moscow conference focusing on the dangers of human rights activities in Russia.
"We want to bring these issues to the core of EU-Russian relations," Hautala said.
Activists are regularly attacked and sometimes killed despite promises by President Dmitry Medvedev to address the situation. There have been no convictions in July's slaying of activist Natalya Estemirova, nor in the January 2009 killing of human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov, who worked with her in Chechnya.
Veteran rights advocate Lyudmila Alexeyeva said fear pervades all branches of rights activism in present day Russia. "No one knows who will be the next Estemirova," she said
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