러시아ㆍ유라시아

The focus of the study is the Council of Europe (CoE) and the member states Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. The CoE claims to be the guardian of European values and acts as an antechamber to the EU. Before any EU candidacy can be discussed, prospective candidates need to be accepted as willing and able members of the CoE and finish a period of monitoring. The three states above have been under scrutiny since the turn of the century, with no end to the monitoring in sight. The aim of this study is to explore the continued critical dialogue between a parliamentary assembly with rather unclear authority and its new members. If it is assumed that states in general treasure their sovereignty, and members of a community of democracies ought to respect each other’s constitutional integrity, the long-term monitoring of new members becomes puzzling. This article will investigate the occurrence of interference, the authority employed to ensure interference, and the continuation of a process of interference over an extended period. The study is guided by three research questions: 1) What events led to interference and what were the responses? 2) How did interference affect the authority of the monitoring? 3) Why did the process of interference continue?