ST.PETERSBURG, Russia (AP) — Russia's Consitutional Court has ruled that a moratorium on capital punishment should remain in force until the nation fully outlaws the death penalty.
Constitutional Court chief Valery Zorkin says that Russia must extend the moratorium on executions until it ratifies a European convention banning the death penalty.
Russia announced a moratorium on capital punishment when it joined the Council of Europe in 1996 and pledged to abolish it, but has not done so.
The ruling came as an earlier moratorium on death penalty imposed in 1999 was to lose its legal foundation in January.
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