The Ministry of Justice doesn’t need much, it needs everything!

We are publishing a legal analysis of the draft law “On Amendments to the Federal Law “On Freedom of Conscience and religious associations” and other legislative acts in terms of improving control over the activities of religious organizations”.

January 20, 2015 became it is known that the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation has completed the preparation of amendments to the draft Federal Law: "On the Introduction amendments to the Federal Law “On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations” and other legislative acts in terms of improving control over activities religious organizations” regulating objectives, competence and procedure for inspections of religious organizations by the Ministry Justice of the Russian Federation.

Despite the fact that this the draft was finalized and after consultations with experts and representatives religious organizations, some of its provisions were relaxed, it still doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

So, according to Art. 3 of this document, it is proposed to amend Art. 25 of the Federal Law of September 26 1997 No. 125-FZ

“On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations” and state paragraph 2 of this articles in the following edition:

"2. Organ, authorized to decide on the state registration of religious organizations, supervises their compliance legislation of the Russian Federation , as well as the goals and procedure activities provided for by their charters during the federal state supervision over the activities of religious organizations”;

Thus, according to the proposed norm, the Ministry of Justice is trying to impose control over compliance with the legislation of the Russian Federation by religious organizations, whereas today this function is directly entrusted to the bodies prosecutors. Thus, the requirements of paragraph 10 of Art. 3 of the Federal Law of December 26, 2008 No. 294-FZ "On the protection of the rights of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs in implementation of state control (supervision) and municipal control”, according to which the basic principles of protecting the rights of legal entities, individual entrepreneurs in the exercise of state control (supervision), municipal control, in particular, is: “the delineation of powers of federal executive bodies in relevant areas of activity authorized to carry out federal state control (supervision), state the authorities of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation in the relevant areas of activity, authorized to exercise regional state control (supervision), on the basis of federal laws and laws of the subjects of the Russian Federation".

Moreover, if this amendment is made to the current Federal Law "On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations", then we get the following, absolutely strange edition:

"Article 25. Implementation of supervision and control

1. Supervision over the implementation of legislation Russian Federation on freedom of conscience, freedom of religion and religious associations are carried out by the prosecutor's office of the Russian Federation.

2. Organ, authorized to make a decision on the state registration of religious organizations that oversee their compliance with the legislation of the Russian Federation, as well as the goals and order of activities provided for by their charters during the federal state supervision over the activities of religious organizations”;

As a result, we see both legally and (especially attention) lexically illiterate norm in the proposed version of the federal law - in addition, the same powers are held by two different supervisory bodies, with the only difference is in the play on words: “supervision over the implementation of legislation” - with on the part of the prosecutor's office and "monitoring compliance with the law" - on the part of the Ministry of Justice.

Meanwhile, paragraph 5 of Art. 3 of the Federal Law "On the Protection of the Rights of Legal Entities and individual entrepreneurs in the exercise of state control (supervision) and municipal control" speaks directly about the inadmissibility of ongoing in relation to one legal entity or one individual entrepreneur several bodies of state control (supervision), bodies municipal control of inspections of the execution of the same mandatory requirements and requirements established by municipal legal acts;

The question involuntarily arises: how The Ministry of Justice is going to exercise control functions over compliance legislation, if he ignores these requirements?

Further, it is proposed to supplement Art. 25 Federal Law "On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations" para. 3 - 8 as follows:

"3. TO relations related to the protection of the rights of religious organizations in the implementation federal state supervision over the activities of religious organizations, the provisions of the Federal Law of December 26, 2008 No. 294-FZ “On protection of the rights of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs in the implementation state control (supervision) and municipal control”, taking into account this article of special features.

However, this paragraph is at least strange, since the action the Law No. 294 referred to in it does not apply to the prosecution authorities. The the bill also does not propose to amend the current law “On Prosecutor’s Office” and Law No. 294, supplementing it with the rule that the prosecution authorities also act in accordance with Law No. 294. In this regard, it turns out legally illiterate construction:

P. 1, Art. 25 of the Federal Law "On freedom of conscience and religious associations” refers to the supervision of religious organizations by the authorities prosecutors;

Clause 2 of this article on control over religious organizations by authorities justice;

while paragraph 3 establishes that, to relations related to protection of the rights of religious organizations in the implementation of federal state supervision over the activities of religious organizations are applied the provisions of Federal Law No. 294, which, meanwhile, did not distributed by! But, the farther into the forest, the more firewood.

Next, Art. 25 of the Federal Law "On freedom of conscience and religious associations” it is proposed to supplement clause 4 with the following content:

"IN in relation to a religious organization, the body authorized to make decisions on 25 state registration of religious organizations, and its officials in in the manner prescribed by the legislation of the Russian Federation, have the right:

1) request the governing bodies of a religious organization have documents on activities religious organization, with the exception of documents containing information about financial and economic activities of a religious organization, which may be obtained in accordance with subparagraphs 2 and 3 of this paragraph”;

It would seem that this is what they have been waiting for so long: finally, an end to the issue of exceeding the competence of the judicial authorities when demanding from religious organizations with a complete package of documents on financial and economic activities, including estimates, contracts, acts, accounting and tax reporting, etc., which, in principle, has always been the prerogative of the tax authorities.

However, not everything turned out to be so simple. Proposed paragraph. 2 in paragraph 4 of Art. 25 Federal Law "On freedom of conscience and on religious associations" contains one big "But". It is proposed to adopt it in the following edition:

"2) request the governing bodies of a religious organization have documents containing information about its financial and economic activities, if the religious organization had receipts of funds and other property from international and foreign organizations, from foreign citizens and stateless persons and (or) in if from state bodies, local governments received information about the violation of the law by a religious organization Russian Federation in the field of its activities and (or) on the presence in its activity signs of extremism (terrorism)”;

So in what cases will the justice authorities be able to request from the authorities management of a religious organization documents containing information about its financial and economic activity?

“*In case: *

·  religious the organization had receipts of cash and other property from international and foreign organizations, from foreign citizens and persons without citizenship;

·  from state bodies, local self-government bodies received information about violation by a religious organization of the legislation of the Russian Federation in the scope of its activities;

·   if available information that in the activities of a religious organization there are signs of extremism (terrorism) ”.

At the same time, we draw the attention of readers to the fact that justice will be able to request from the governing bodies of a religious organization documents containing information about its financial and economic activities not in set of the above cases, and in the case of the presence of at least one of them.

But it doesn't end there either. Subparagraph 5 allows not only to request documents, but also to conduct inspections of the financial and economic activities of religious organizations, including in terms of receipt and (or) expenditure of charitable donations and other funds, the use of other property, if the religious organization had receipts of funds and other property from international and foreign organizations, from foreign citizens and stateless persons and (or) if from state bodies, bodies local self-government received information about the violation of religious organization of the legislation of the Russian Federation in the field of its activities and (or) the presence of signs of extremism (terrorism) in its activities.

You should also pay attention to the proposed seventh paragraph: “ The federal executive body authorized to implementation of the function of countering the legalization (laundering) of income, proceeds of crime and financing of terrorism, analyzes information about the operations of religious organizations obtained by him on the basis of Federal Law of August 7, 2001 No. 115-FZ "On countering legalization (laundering) of proceeds from crime and financing terrorism”, and if there are grounds indicating incompleteness and (or) unreliability of the specified information or that the religious organization is not fulfills or does not fully comply with the requirements of the legislation of the Russian Federation Federation, informs the body authorized to decide on state registration of religious organizations, at the request of the specified authority or on their own initiative ";

Thus, in our opinion, the Ministry of Justice of Russia does not only decided to equate himself with the prosecutor's office in the field of supervision of activities of religious organizations, but also to stand in the forefront in the fight against extremism. And also at the same time, as they say, taking the opportunity to oblige others bodies (banking and credit organizations, a body authorized to carry out functions to counter the legalization (laundering) of income received by criminal means, and financing of terrorism, etc.) to report to the justice authorities all the information known to them and, on this basis, conduct checks on various directions, including in the field of competence of the tax authorities for the use of funds and the implementation of financial and economic activities. The question involuntarily arises: if we have such a single, powerful and omniscient (or wanting to know everything) supervisory body, why should we then everyone else?

It should be noted that this the draft law is distinguished not only by its legal inconsistency and distortion norms, but also illiteracy in legal technique. All points, from the third to the eighth, proposed amendments to Art. 25 of the Federal Law "On freedom of conscience and religious associations” have nothing to do with the prosecution authorities mentioned in paragraph 1. In all these paragraphs, we are talking exclusively about the bodies of justice. So Thus, from the point of view of legal technique, it would be more logical and competent to arrange the data paragraphs as subparagraphs to paragraph 2 of Art. 25.

Remains hope that this bill is frankly unreasonable and illegal exceeding the competence of the judiciary, as well as differing in its legal, and sometimes lexical illiteracy, will remain deservedly overlooked by the legislator.