Rosfinmonitoring proposed to temporarily block accounts for organizing inconsistent shares

Rosfinmonitoring submitted to the State Duma a bill allowing temporary blocking of accounts for organizing inconsistent shares. The text of the bill is published on the website of the Federal Portal of draft regulatory legal acts.

The amendment to “prevent the use of bank accounts (deposits) and electronic means of payment in order to finance activities aimed at organizing and (or) public activities in violation of the established procedure” is currently at the stage of public hearings. This proposal is part of the bill “On Amending Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation in terms of countering the financing of terrorism and (or) other unlawful acts”.

According to the proposed norms, in cases where confirmed and documented information about the use of accounts to finance the organization of public measures in violation of the law will appear, some representatives of the executive will be able to suspend monetary operations related to the write -off of funds from these accounts for up to 10 days.

The basis for the proposal to block accounts was that, according to the authors of the bill, inconsistent shares can lead to riots, pogroms, arson, a violation of life support objects, transport or social infrastructure and other negative consequences.

In order to “ensure the inviolability of the minimum of the property necessary for the existence of an individual” and his family that does not have an independent source of income, it is proposed to assign payments not exceeding the cost of living.

If the bill is adopted, the blocking of accounts will not apply to situations such as payment from a blocked labor account and payments related to the provision of guarantees provided for by the Labor Code; payment of taxes, fees, fines and other obligatory payments; Expenses for the payment of housing and utilities.

The coordinator of the legal department of the OTD-Info Alexander Baeva comments on the Rosfinmonitoring bill:

“Blocking accounts is not an innovation, such a practice has existed for a long time. It is mainly associated with tax liabilities, debts, credit debts and so on. Rosfinmonitoring is engaged in counteracting the financing of terrorism. Now they have made a proposal where, among other things, an offer has been made to block accounts in connection with the alleged financing of mass public events that can develop into riots, arson and so on.

Judging by the text, this is considered as a preventive measure. The first question to the bill, how the search and confirmation of such cases will be carried out in which it is necessary to block the accounts. The text is emphasized that the information should be "pre -confirmed and documented." Secondly, how they will reveal the intention of a citizen or organization to finance such shares. Thirdly, how the police officers will be checked if the blocking occurs, and the information will be unconfirmed.

In general, we already see that there are forms of economic pressure on politically active citizens and they are growing. We understand that now the authorities are doing everything to coordinate peaceful public events, and without coordination, formally, I consider the authorities illegal, although we have a notification procedure for coordination, and not permissive. And what the authorities call “mass riots” is not in fact. This illustrates the criminal case after the action on July 27, 2019, when the authorities saw the riots, and then closed the case.

Such initiatives must be carefully monitored, since they can be quite repressive and limit the right to freedom of assembly. ”

• Earlier, ATD-Info talked in detail about how the law on rallies was tightened. In particular, the authorities completely banned foreign or anonymous financing of public events, limited the number of places where it is possible to hold shares, limited the possibility of campaigning before a public event and so on.