Deputies are developing a bill that would prohibit advertising from participants in the register of “foreign agents.” State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin wrote about this.
“The State Duma is discussing a bill that proposes to prohibit citizens and domestic companies, regardless of their form of ownership, from placing advertisements on the websites of foreign agents, on their social networks and on other Internet platforms. “, Volodin’s post says.
He motivated this by the fact that he “received numerous requests” and that “people are outraged” by the advertising of Russian companies by bloggers included in the register.
The authors of the bill on “foreign agents”, work on which began in 2012 after the protests on Bolotnaya Square, explained them by saying that innovations are needed to “ensure publicity” of the work of register participants and “in no way prohibit their activities” and “do not infringe upon them in rights.»
President Vladimir Putin subsequently repeated these arguments. “This law [on “foreign agents”] does not prohibit [the registry participant] from further engaging in this activity, it only requires that the person open sources of funding,” he said in 2023.
Package of laws 2012 year introduced articles for “foreign agents” in the Code of Administrative Offenses and the Criminal Code, including with possible imprisonment. Subsequently, deputies allowed the media, unregistered associations and ordinary people to be recognized as “foreign agents”, in addition to NGOs.
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In the summer of 2022, new tightenings were introduced into the law: the Ministry of Justice was removed from the obligation to prove “foreign funding” in order to add a person to the register. Previously, the reason for this was transfers from foreigners of several hundred rubles. Now it is enough for a person to be under «foreign influence».
Participants in the registry were prohibited from teaching children or make content for them, work in the civil service, receive funding from the state and participate in government procurement, be members of election commissions and organizers of any public events, including protests.
In 2023, deputies introduced liability for people who “interact with "foreign agents" and can help them.» So far, no cases of these fines have been reported.
Criminal readiness. The Ministry of Justice and the RKN are massively issuing fines to “foreign agents” in order to bring them under criminal charges