The Ministry of Justice wants to extend unscheduled extremism checks to all NGOs

January 29, 2013 on the website of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation was published the draft Federal Law "On Amendments to Article 32 Federal Law "On Non-Commercial Organizations", prepared department. The draft provides for the extension to all non-profit organizations of the procedure for conducting unscheduled inspections adopted in relation to NGOs registered as "foreign agents".

One of the grounds for conducting an unscheduled inspection of NGOs in the draft law called " admission to the authorized body (its territorial body) appeals and statements of citizens, legal entities, information from state bodies, local governments, from the media about facts indicating the presence in the activities of a non-profit organization signs of extremism .

Recall that in November 2011 this provision was excluded from the Federal Law on NGOs, but it reappeared in the law "On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation Regarding the Regulation of the Activities of Non-Commercial Organizations Acting as Foreign Agents", adopted on July 20, 2012 , that is, it applies only to those NPOs that will be given the title of "agent". The new draft law proposes to extend this practice to all NGOs.

It should be noted that unscheduled inspections of NPOs do not bring noticeable results, since, as a rule, they check documentation, which hardly makes it possible to identify "facts of extremism", but once again complicates the work of organizations that have nothing to do with extremist activities.

Probably, the appearance of the bill is due to the fact that the Ministry of Justice needs unscheduled inspections in order to establish whether an NPO is engaged in “political activities” in the sense of the “foreign agents law” and the “Dima Yakovlev law”. And at the same time, the opportunity is offered to arrange unscheduled "checks for extremism" at the request of any citizens and organizations.

On June 4, 2013, the bill was approved by the Commission of the Government of the Russian Federation on legislative activity. Among the grounds for inspections of NCOs, as before, mention was made of " the receipt by the authorized body of appeals and applications from citizens, legal entities, information from state bodies, local authorities, from the media about facts indicating the presence of signs of extremism in the activities of a non-profit organization. " Sources

• Draft federal law "On Amendments to Article 32 of the Federal Law "On Non-Commercial Organizations" // Website of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation. 2013. January 29.
• Government commission approves tightening control over NGOs // BFM.ru. 2013. June 4.