RESOLUTION ADOPTED BY THE STATE DUMA OF THE FEDERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION on Legal Effect for the Russian Federation of the Results of the USSR Referendum of 17 March of 1991 on the issue of Keeping the USSR

Confirming the ambition of the peoples of Russia to the economic and political integration with the states established on the territory of the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics, responding to the numerous appeals of the subjects of the Russian federation, considering the results of the Referendum of the Republic of Belorus of 14 May 1995, being guided with the idea of restoring the state unity of the peoples of the USSR in any acceptable form,

the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation decrees:

1. To approve for the Russian Federation the results of the USSR’s Referendum on the issue of keeping the USSR held on the territory of the RSFSR on 17 March  1991.

2. To note that the officials of the RSFSR, who drafted, signed and ratified the decision on cessation of existence of the USSR, grossly violated the will of the peoples of the Russian Federation expressed by them at the USSR’s Referendum held on 17 March 1991, as well as the Declaration on State Sovereignty of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist  Republic stating on the ambition of the peoples of Russia to establish the democratic legal state within the renewed USSR.

3. To confirm, that the Agreement on establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States, signed on 8 December 1991 by the President of the RSFSR B.N. Yeltsin and the State Secretary of the RSFSR G.E. Khasbulatov, which was not approved at the Congress of People’s Deputies of the RSFSR had and still has no legal effect in the part of cessation of existence of the USSR.

4. To take note of the fact, that interstate and intergovernmental agreements on political, economic, defence and other issues concluded within the frame of the Agreement on Establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States shall retain their legal force until the involved states make volunteer and free decision on reestablishment of the unified state, or until these states make decision on termination of validity of the aforementioned agreements.

5. To advise the Government of the Russian Federation to take necessary measures for maintaining the unified economic, political and informational space, for developing and strengthening of links between the states established on the territory of the USSR.

6. The deputies delegated to the Interparliamentary Assembly of the Commonwealth of Independent States shall facilitate to the process of developing the Interparliamentary Assembly as an effective tool for integration and cooperation of states established on the territory of the USSR.

7. The Committees of the State Duma shall elaborate and submit to the Council of State Duma the action plan for removing the aftermath of dissolution of the USSR, first of all with regard of Soviet citizens still not having determined their status of citizenship.

Chairman of the State Duma

of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation  G. N. Seleznyev

15 March 1996, Moscow

(Collection of Legislation of the RF, M., 1996, # 13, p. 3152-3153/in Russian)