"Cloak and dagger"

The Chuvash human rights organization "Shield and Sword" became the first non -profit organization to voluntarily have a request to the Ministry of Justice with a request to include it in the list of foreign agents. This was reported by an open news agency. Thus, human rights activists are going to "study the new law from the inside" and "create precedents to protect other NPOs working for the benefit of the inhabitants of Russia."

The chairman of the organization Alexei Glukhov explained that the law on "foreign agents" contains many blurry formulations, and the Ministry of Justice evades clarification. The inclusion in the corresponding register of the Ministry of Justice will allow other human rights activists to understand how to proceed, Glukhov believes.

"We see the only possible way out - to enter the register in order to understand from the inside how it works in order to force the Ministry of Justice to answer and explain in order to be able to appeal decisions within this law and initiate trials, including in the Russian Constitutional Court," he said.

"Shield and Sword" - co -founder and partner organization of the Association "Agora". Therefore, the decision to include foreign agents in the register was made by the general meeting of not only the organization, but also the association. The head of the Agora Pavel Chikov in the Human Rights Council is responsible for the monitoring of the new law and will prepare proposals for its amendment. In September, representatives of the Agora Association asked the Ministry of Justice to explain which NPOs would be considered foreign agents. However, the Ministry of Justice evaded the answer.

“Of course, we are not and do not consider ourselves foreign agents,” Glukhov said. “We are in the registry for a short while, how to appeal everything that can be appealed, we will immediately go out. Although, judging by the law, it may be easier to enter the register than to come out. But this procedure is also interested in us.”

On December 3, the Ministry of Justice issued an order "On the procedure for maintaining a register of non -profit organizations performing the functions of a foreign agent." In the final edition, the procedure for leaving the list of foreign agents disappeared from it. “The main thing is that the Ministry of Justice removed the option of exclusion from the registry in general,” Chikov said then, noting that “all the paradoxes of this law became even more convex.”

On November 21, the Law on NPO - "foreign agents" entered into force. Any Russian NGOs that meets two signs - financing from abroad and political activity - must be mandatory in the register of non -profit organizations performing the functions of a "foreign agent". These NPOs will be included in a special register, and for them a different legal regime will act than for ordinary NPOs - providing, in particular, special reporting and special checks. A foreign source in the document refers to all the money that goes from abroad - from governments, states, international and other organizations, as well as from civilian, legal entities and stateless persons.

The adoption of the law caused a sharply negative reaction of human rights organizations. The human rights center "Memorial" and the Human Rights movement "said they would not abandon foreign grants, but at the same time they are not going to register as" foreign agents ". The Ministry of Justice warned that it would close for six months of NPOs, who would refuse to submit to the new law on "foreign agents". If the violations are not corrected, other sanctions will be applied to the heads of NPOs, up to criminal prosecution.