death_penalty_new.qxd 02-08-27 12:57 Page 45 RUSSIAN FEDERATION 4.13 RUSSIAN FEDERATION157 RELEVANT INTERNATIONAL INSTRUMENTS International Instruments Signed Ratified Article 6 of the ICCPR Yes Yes Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR No No Article 37 (a) of the CRC Yes Yes Protocol No.6 to the ECHR Yes No Protocol No.13 to the ECHR No No LEGAL FRAMEWORK Status: De facto abolitionist Scope: The death penalty is a legal punishment for crimes committed in peacetime and in wartime. The Constitution of the Russian Federation provides for the death penalty as an exceptional punishment for especially grave crimes threatening life158. The federal Criminal Code of the Russian Federation envisages the death penalty for five crimes. These are premeditated murder with aggravating circumstances, assassination attempt against a state or public figure, assassination attempt against a person administering justice or conducting a preliminary investigation, assassination attempt against a law enforcement officer and genocide159. With the introduction of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation of 1996 the number of capital offences was reduced from 33 to five. However, the five crimes that were retained were those that had previously accounted for the majority of death sentences160. 157 158 159 160 This entry was written with the assistance of the Delegation of the Russian Federation to the OSCE and the NGO ‘Institute for Human Rights’, Moscow who completed our questionnaire on the death penalty. Article 20(2). of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, 25 December 1993. Articles 105(2), 277, 295, 317 and 357 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, 13 June 1996. ‘Death is not justice, The Council of Europe and the Death Penalty’, Directorate General of Human Rights, Council of Europe, October 2001. 45