105 NOTE PARTICIPATION IN INTERNATIONAL TRADE ORGANIZATIONS AS AN INDIRECT MEANS OF STRENGTHENING HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION By Bartosz Mendyk Author PhD student, Jan Kochanowski University, Kielce E-mail: kancelaria@ius-europae.pl Abstract For historical and geopolitical reasons, as well as circumstantial reasons stemming from regional alliances and pacts, Russia cannot duplicate the methods of unifi cation that have come to be known throughout Western Europe. <...> Some of them, especially Kazakhstan, are afraid of this dissonance and disagree with enhanced cooperation on a political level. <...> The EU’s objective is to maintain its position as a major investor in the Russian economy, despite temporary problems. <...> Activity in the WTO, in connection with the Customs Union agenda, increases household income, while trade modernization within the economy helps to protect human rights. <...> This is quite an unexpected effect of internal reforms and accession to the WTO. The WTO strengthens the rights of intellectual property owners and the instruments that they use to enforce those rights in courts. <...> This is one of the examples of how people in Russia have attained an additional instrument for defending their rights. <...> Keywords International Trade Organizations, WTO, human rights, Russian Federation Volume 1 September 2014 Issue 1 www.kulawr.ru 106 KUTAFIN UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW Introduction The mutual relationship between trade and human rights is increasingly noticeable from the point of view of both domains. <...> There has recently been a discussion about the impact of patents on prices for essential drugs, which affects a people’s right to healthcare in many poorer parts of the world.1 Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, various initiatives have been aimed at re-integrating independent republics. <...> Contracting parties have signed a large amount of international agreements and organized a number of meetings at the highest political level, but they have failed to reverse the trend of isolationism.2 In the aftermath of the aforementioned turn of events (in the mid2000s), the European Union decided to increase its involvement in post-Soviet countries. <...> The rectifi cation of the legal system was considered to be a key precondition for closer relations, in the context of the European Neighborhood Policy (ENP)3 and the Eastern Partnership (EaP).4 As a result of operational state standards, treatments were <...>