Amnesty International's claim that Ireland had failed to take effective action against the Russian Federation on the Chechen crisis during its presidency of the Council of Europe was strongly rejected by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, yesterday.

Speaking on Mr Cowen's behalf, the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Ms Liz O'Donnell, said the current Council of Europe role of maintaining human rights experts in Chechnya had been initiated by Ireland during its presidency. This had been acknowledged by the council's Commissioner for Human Rights, Mr Alvaro GilRobles, who had told The Irish Times on March 26th: "It was in large measure due to Ireland's interest that so much has been achieved."

The secretary-general of the Council of Europe, Mr Walter Schwimmer, had expressed surprise following publication of the Amnesty International report at the criticism of Irish involvement with the Chechen conflict in these words: "Ireland made a significant impact on these issues during its term in office and to now accuse it of failing to take action is, in my view, mistaken and misdirected."

Chechnya was the dominant political issue during Ireland's presidency of the council, Ms O'Donnell said in response to a question from the Fine Gael spokesman on foreign affairs. During this period the council's parliamentary assembly decided to withdraw the voting rights of the Russian members. "This sent a clear signal to Russia that the Council of Europe would not be prepared to tolerate violation of its commitments as a member of the organisation."

The approach was to maintain maximum pressure on Russia to fulfil its obligations to the council - to protect the human rights of individual Chechens.

Ireland's view was - and remained - that the council "could not make that contribution" unless Russia remained a member of the organisation. No member-state supported Russia's suspension from the council.