On implementing the lanzarote convention provisions in russian and foreign legislation

In 2013 Russia ratified the Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse (CETS N 201) of October 25, 2007 (Lanzarote, Spain). The Council of Europe supports the One in Five campaign, based on the available data that one in five children in Europe are victims of some form of sexual or other violence, which often happens within the family circle. Although it is an urgent problem for Russia as well, full statistical data are unavailable and there is a lack of solid research. At present the co-signer countries are going though a complicated process of implementing the Convention’s clauses in their criminal legislations, and practically all of them face similar lawmaking and law enforcement problems. The authors of the paper, who took part in the Lanzarote Committee meetings, have analyzed criminal legislation of Russia and authors’ translations of the new versions of criminal codes of Austria, Turkey and Spain. They have thoroughly examined the latest publications on the topic and used court practice examples in their analysis of Russian criminal law. The authors conclude that Russian law, unlike foreign ones, has mainly incorporated Lanzarote convention’s clauses. However, a number of clauses require an adequate response from Russian lawmakers, who should introduce changes and amendments to criminal laws of the Russian Federation, in particular, regarding increased penalties for offences against the sexual inviolability of minors by persons from a child’s «circle of trust». © 2017, Baikal National University of Economics and Law. All rights reserved.