On 2 March 2022, the President of the Czech Constitutional Court proposed to expel the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation from the Conference of European Constitutional Courts (CECC), or, alternatively, suspend its membership. By this motion, he reacted to the invasion of Ukraine by the armed forces of the Russian Federation, a flagrant violation of international law and a trampling of the values on which the international community is founded. Pavel Rychetský stated that it is hard to imagine a conduct more contrary to the principles of democracy, the rule of law and the protection of human rights to which the CECC is committed. For that reason, he considered it impossible for the CECC to continue to cooperate properly and effectively with the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation which is one of the supreme constitutional bodies of the state. 

Pavel Rychetsky´s initiative was supported immediately by several other constitutional courts and four member courts submitted similar proposals. On 4 March, the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Moldova, which now chairs the CECC, asked the members of the CECC to decide on the above issue by correspondence vote. However, while the vote was still in progress, the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation announced its withdrawal from the CECC. It justified this by “the dangerous politicisation of the CECC and the European Constitutional Courts´s distorted understanding of the role and purpose of constitutional justice”. 

Thus, as of 5 March 2022, the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation ceased to be a member of the Conference of European Constitutional Courts.