It was less than three weeks ago that justice minister Alexander Konovalov proposed Viktor Evtukhov, the deputy from St Petersburg Legislative Assembly, to Russian government to fill the position of Russian Representative in the European Court for Human Rights, in a capacity of deputy justice minister. Now, however, Mr. Konovalov called off his proposal. 

Georgy Matiushkin is the new candidate proposed to the appointment above. The 42-year-old jurist graduated from Department of Law in Moscow State University in 1988. Then he worked as a lawyer, deputy chair of the inter-territorial board of the Bar titled “Klishin&Partners”. In 1991 he had an in-depth training course in Houston, in      Baker & Botts. In the early 2000’s Mr. Matiushkin worked in Chuvashia (a Russian Republic) as minister of state property, then deputy chair and later the chair of the Republican cabinet ministry. Afterwards, he was deputy the Authorized Representative of the President in Privolzhsky Federal District (trans-Volga region) – the position that was held by Konovalov himself till 2008.    

It’s difficult to say now how successful will Mr. Matiushkin be on the Strasburg “post”, but he is at least a professional jurist with a significant working experience. And what has been happening about Viktor Evtukhov only deserves to be named a funny incident.

His colleagues, the deputies, had already begun estimating who was going to substitute him in the city’s parliament and in the position of the chair of the Legislative Committee. The Governor Valentina Matvienko had praised the “young and promising” politician who “had had a good school of law-making activities” and had “great potential”. And now it turns out, all that was in vain.   

Mr. Evtukhov has had a specific reputation in the Petersburg’s parliament. He supported invariably any standing city’s administration and always praised the policy by Putin. When debating the topic of canceling the elections for governors, he stated that “Russia has always been a patriarchal country, and the Russian people have always thought of authority as of power executed by a single person – monarch, General Secretary, or President”. 

Possibly, the change of mind was related to the fact that Moscow realizes perfectly the juridical “abilities” by Viktor Evtukhov and realizes that in coming consideration in Strasburg of the YUKOS case this autumn there would be no reason to count on the “young and promising”. However, it is also possible that it’s just about the clan’s interests that are stronger than school friendship by Konovalov and Evtukhov (they also went for boat racing in same sports group).