The Death Penalty in the OSCE Area 65 Protocol No. 6 to the ECHR.140 The commissioner for human rights of the Council of Europe has called on the Russian Federation to ratify Protocol No. 6 to the ECHR as soon as possible.141 The Russian Federation confirms that the legislative abolition of the death penalty is one of the goals of the juridical and legal reforms currently under way in the Russian Federation and that government departments are currently engaged in intensive preparations for the State Duma’s ratification of Protocol No. 6 to the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and the introduction of the relevant amendments and additions to the Criminal Code, the Code of Criminal Procedure, and the Criminal Executive Code of the Russian Federation.142 Moratorium A presidential decree instituted a moratorium on executions in 1996.143 Furthermore, a ruling of the Constitutional Court placed a temporary prohibition on the passage of death sentences on 2 February 1999. The Russian Constitution guarantees the right to trial by jury in cases where the death penalty is a potential sentence.144 Accordingly, the Constitutional Court adopted a resolution prohibiting the passage of death sentences until such time as jury trials are introduced throughout the Russian Federation. At the time of the decision, jury trials were available in only nine of the 89 constituent entities of the Federation. It is envisaged that jury trials will have been introduced throughout the Russian Federation by 1 January 2007. The introduction of jury trials will remove the bar that the Constitutional Court has placed upon the passage of death sentences. The UN Human Rights Committee expressed its concern that the current moratorium would automatically end once the jury system has been introduced and called upon the Russian Federation to abolish the death penalty de jure before the expiration of the moratorium and to accede to the Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR.145 140 141 Resolution 1277, 23 April 2002; Parliamentary Assembly session: 24 to 30 June 2006, 29 June 2006. Report by Alvaro Gil-Robles on his visits to the Russian Federation on 15-30 July 2004, 19-29 September 2004, and 20 April 2005. 142 Comments by the Government of the Russian Federation to the concluding observations of the Human Rights Committee, CCPR/CO/79/RUS/Add.1, 2 February 2005, Paragraph 11. 143 Presidential Decree No. 724 “On the gradual decrease of the application of the death penalty in connection with accession to the Council of Europe”, 16 May 1996. 144 145 Article 20 (2) of the Constitution. Concluding observations of the Human Rights Committee: Russian Federation, 6 November 2003; CCPR/CO/79/ RUS, 6 November 2003, Paragraph 11.