MOSCOW, June 25 (RAPSI) – The European Commission for Democracy through Law (the Venice Commission) has acknowledged that the primacy of Russia’s Constitution is totally legitimate, according to Co-Chair of the working group on drafting amendments to the Constitution, Director of the Institute of Legislation and Comparative Legal Studies at the Government of Russia Talia Khabriyeva.

It is absolutely unacceptable that some continue to misinterpret the opinion of the advisory body on constitutional matters of the Council of Europe as to Article 79 of Russia’s Constitution, Khabriyeva said when commenting on the Commission’s opinion on the draft amendments to Russia’s Constitution of June 18 in her address to a working group meeting on Thursday.

She believes that in its conclusions the Venice Commission recognized that the supremacy of the Constitution was absolutely legitimate, since the balance between national and international law is to be determined by a state itself as it is its sovereign right.

The Venice Commission noted, according to Khabriyeva, that in the countries where Constitutions prevail over international treaties (almost all European states, U.S., Japan) these documents may collide; however, in such cases the Commission says the issue is to be decided in the framework of a dialogue between the European Court of Human Rights and a respective Constitutional Court. Russia’s Constitutional Court has started such a dialogue already, Khabriyeva observes.