OREANDA-NEWS. July 05, 2011. Dmitry Medvedev chaired a meeting of the Council for Civil Society Institutions and Human Rights in the capital of Kabardino-Balkaria.

Civil society’s role in promoting interethnic and interreligious harmony, as well as in combating terrorism and extremism were the subjects of discussion.

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PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA DMITRY MEDVEDEV: Good afternoon, colleagues,

As agreed earlier, this meeting is taking place in the North Caucasus Federal District. Considering all our current efforts and challenges, I believe this location is well suited to a discussion of the civil society’s role in maintaining ethnic harmony and in the prevention of extremism.

There is another issue that is highly relevant for our country: the harmonisation of interethnic relations. I raised this topic in Ufa recently and discussed it with religious leaders. Today I would like to talk about this matter with you.

I think there are several important aspects here. We must adopt a complex approach in our efforts related to interethnic relations.

Legislative measures are a major theme, including imposing restrictions on holding public office for individuals who have previous convictions for extremist crimes.

Another issue is information. We are doing our utmost at present to ensure that every ethnic minority has its own media outlets, websites and other resources that every nation should have.

The third aspect is personnel. This includes equal access to municipal jobs and non-discrimination on ethnic grounds. We have a problem with that. I am referring to the situation in general, not in any single republic or region, be it in the Caucasus, or in the central area, or in Moscow.

The fourth issue is history. That is also an important topic, because any interpretations that engender negative stereotypes about a particular nation are absolutely inadmissible and dangerous, and can lead to enormous problems.

We could also talk about the situation in the Caucasus in general, as we had planned to. Naturally, we can do it in the context of specific republics. That's why I thought it would be appropriate to meet in one of the North Caucasus republics, which have their own achievements and difficulties.

Another matter: at the previous Council meeting we agreed to review the implementation of my instructions. There are quite a lot of them, several dozen instructions in total. Concrete decisions have already been adopted on some of them, while work is ongoing on the others. No doubt, you will have some questions about this, what has been done and what hasn’t. Nevertheless, I believe that we have achieved success in some areas, in part as a result of the Council members’ initiatives.

In May, a law was passed amending the legislation on children's rights, including the right to communicate with parents in the event of the parents being separated. This is what we have discussed.

On the basis of another initiative put forward by the Council and some Council members, the draft federal law on the basics of health protection has been adopted, which also included the rules for granting one parent the right to remain with a child in hospital during the period of treatment.

At a meeting in Yekaterinburg we discussed the topic of setting up public councils under the Interior Ministry and other agencies. I signed a relevant executive order in May.

There were some other points we have focused on, including a positive decision on payments to World War II veterans who live in Latvia. But I am sure there is a great deal more to be done and great many issues to discuss, which you will raise in your characteristically open manner today.