Russia should have a law on foreign agents, the Kremlin believes. As the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov said, the very fact of the necessity of such a law “no one disputes”. However, he added, now there are a number of norms in the legislation that require “adjustments”.
“It’s another matter that, as it was recently said at a meeting on human rights, law enforcement practice revealed a number of omissions and imperfections in this law,” RIA Novosti quotes Peskov.
In particular, the press secretary of the president noted, it is necessary to give the media an opportunity to rectify the situation. “You can probably not immediately stick a label, but notify that you are showing signs of a foreign agent, and if you do not correct the situation within such and such a period and do not notify us, then you will be named a foreign agent. Probably, we need to more clearly define a scheme for exiting the status of a foreign agent, ”he noted.
“Therefore, I have no doubt that some kind of revision of the law will be carried out … You just need to sit well, make the necessary changes to the law and regulate law enforcement,” Peskov said.
In addition, he believes that there will be no one to replace the vacuum if the media, now recognized by foreign agents, are closed. “It won’t work, from my point of view. You can create as many companies as you like, they will be dead, “said Peskov, explaining that” when journalists gather and create some kind of separate editorial office, this is a rather unique phenomenon. “
Earlier today, the judge of the Zamoskvoretsky District Court of Moscow, Nelly Rubtsova, did not satisfy the claim of RS-Balt JSC (the founder of Rosbalt IA) against the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation on entering the register of foreign media agents.
During the court session, the representative of “RS-Balt” Dmitry Firsov emphasized that the Ministry of Justice’s objections to the claim contained false information, which, as follows from the document, served as the basis for including the founder of IA “Rosbalt” in the register of media performing the functions of foreign agents. In particular, the document of the Ministry of Justice mentions “an analyst of Rosbalt, who cooperates with Radio Liberty (included in the register of mass media performing the functions of a foreign agent). However, for the entire period of its existence, Rosbalt has not had any legal relationship with the said person. Also, Firsov stressed, there is no evidence in the case file of obtaining foreign funding and the dissemination of messages from media-foreign agents. However, the representative of the Ministry of Justice said that their duties do not include proving violations of the media and checking the data received from state bodies – they only make decisions based on the documents received from these bodies.
At the same time, the judge did not take into account the position of the “RS-Balt” lawyer about the absence of adversariality in the process, since the representative of the Ministry of Justice referred in his argumentation to third parties who were not participating in the hearing.
Nikolai Ulyanov, editor-in-chief of the Rosbalt news agency, emphasized that the decision of the Zamoskvoretsky court will be appealed. “We are definitely not satisfied with the verdict of the court. In our opinion, a formal approach to the case was demonstrated, the reliability of the data that served as the basis for entering Rosbalt into the register of foreign agents was not investigated, representatives of the government agencies that provided this information were not involved in the meeting. The decision of the court will be appealed to a higher instance, ”he said.
On October 15, 2021, the Ministry of Justice of Russia entered the legal entity IA Rosbalt JSC RS-Balt into the register of foreign media agents. This decision caused a great public outcry – the agency received support from the professional community, political and public figures. In public speeches, they declared the need to change the legislation on foreign agents or to completely abolish it. The situation with IA “Rosbalt” was cited as a vivid example of the incorrect, in their opinion, action of the existing laws.
Source: Rosbalt
Tristin is an accomplished author and journalist, known for his in-depth and engaging writing on sports. He currently works as a writer at 247 News Agency, where he has established himself as a respected voice in the sports industry.
