Federation Council of Russia

Federation Council of Russia (; Sovet Federatsii) is the upper house of the Federal Assembly of Russia (parliament of the Russian Federation), according to the 1993 Constitution of the Russian Federation. Each of the 83 (Constitution of Russia, Article 65) federal subjects of Russia, consisting of 21 republics, 46 oblasts, nine krais, two federal cities, four autonomous okrugs, and one autonomous oblast send two senators to the Council for a total membership of 166 senators.

The Council holds its sessions within the Main Building on Bolshaya Dmitrovka Street in Moscow, the former home of the Soviet State Building Agency (Gosstroy), with further offices and committee rooms located on Novy Arbat St. The two houses of the Federal Assembly are physically separated, with the State Duma residing in another part of Moscow. Sessions of the Federation Council are held in Moscow from January 25 to July 15 and from September 16 to December 31. Sessions are open to the public. The location of sessions could be changed if the Federation Council so desires, and closed sessions may be convoked.

History

The modern history of the Federation Council begins during the 1993 Constitutional Crisis that pitted President Boris Yeltsin’s unpopular neoliberal and governmental structure reforms against the increasingly radical Congress of People’s Deputies, then the nation’s legislature. Throughout the year, the congress had grown...
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