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MOSCOW, January 17 On February 13, the Moscow City Court will check the legality of a fine of 40 thousand rubles imposed on rapper Morgenstern* for failure to provide reports by a foreign agent to the authorized body, reported in court.
“The court hearing to consider the complaint in the case of an administrative offense is scheduled for February 13 at 10:40,” the court said.
This fine was imposed on Morgenstern* in November last year, having found him guilty of an administrative offense under Part 2 of Article 19.34 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation for that he did not submit income and expense declarations to the Ministry of Justice on time.
The musician's lawyer called the violation minor. The lawyer explained that liability for lack of reporting was introduced only on December 29, 2022, and the contractor is charged with the second half of 2022, that is, the liability was valid for only a few days and the reporting form was approved in less than a week.
Last week, the Savyolovsky Court of Moscow reviewed the third foreign agent protocol against the rapper and fined him 50 thousand rubles for not identifying himself as a foreign agent in his publications on the Internet.
The rapper's representative reported in court that Morgenstern* did not agree with the contents of the protocol drawn up by Roskomnadzor and asked to stop the proceedings, or impose a minimum sentence.
In June 2023, he was also fined 40 thousand. The reason for drawing up the protocol was three posts on Instagram** that were not marked with a foreign agent’s sign.
For repeated violations of the law on the activities of foreign agents, Morgenstern* may face criminal liability.
Morgenstern* entered the register of foreign agents in May 2022. He later appealed the decision of the Ministry of Justice, but the court sided with the department. According to the case materials, the reason for recognizing the musician as a foreign agent was political posts in the Telegram channel “Not Morgenstern” and YouTube videos for which the rapper received more than 29 million rubles from 2020 to 2022 from the company Yoola Labs Ltd. registered in Israel.
* An individual performing the functions of a foreign agent
** The activities of Meta (social networks Facebook and Instagram) are prohibited in Russia as extremist.