Last month, nearly four years after Russia was expelled from the Council of Europe over its invasion of Ukraine, the continent’s oldest intergovernmental organization once again welcomed Russian delegates in an official capacity. They were not, however, the familiar figures that once walked the halls of the Palace of Europe in Strasbourg, the likes of Kremlin television propagandist Pyotr Tolstoy or Russia’s former Washington ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Instead, the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly, which brings together lawmakers from 46 European states, opened its doors to representatives of Russia’s anti-war and pro-democracy opposition, 15 of whom — myself included — now sit on its newly established Platform for Dialogue.

“Russia is not only a regime,” Petra Bayr, an Austrian lawmaker and President of the Assembly, said opening the Platform’s first meeting. “There are people inside and outside the country who reject the war, who condemn the crimes committed in their names, who want their country not to be an aggressor, but a partner. … Europe has not forgotten you.”

Formed in the late 1940s in the wake of the Second World War, the Council of Europe was intended to bring peace and good-neighborly relations to a ravaged continent.........

© Washington Post