СМИ о мероприятиях

| 14 февраля, 2013

Over 60 pct of Russians hail ban on officials’ foreign bank accounts

MOSCOW, February 14 (Itar-Tass) – More than 60 percent of Russians support the ban on officials’ foreign bank accounts, the head of the national public opinion studies center, VTsIOM, Valery Fyodorov, said at the round table conference Nationalization of the Elites, arranged by the Civil Society Development Fund. The invited experts discussed Vladimir Putin’s bill prohibiting civil servants from having bank accounts abroad.

“For most Russians the question was settled a long while ago. Any measures to halt the pumping of funds out of the country to another one enjoy wholesale support. There are no discussions on that score. A firm majority – 61 percent – are for that bill,” Fyodorov said.

Public Chamber member Sergei Markov sees the bill as a solution of the problem of civil servants’ double loyalty.

“They are invited to opt for one loyalty. The people want all officials and civil servants to be morally and physically in Russia. Everything must be in Russia – money, wives, children and lovers,” Markov said.

“I do hope that this is a major step towards creating a national elite. I hope that sovereign democracy, ridiculed for so long, will become a reality at last. It is a step towards building a nation state,” a member of the presidential council for the promotion of civil society and human rights, Maxim Shevchenko said.

Another member of the human rights council, Leonid Polyakov, has pointed to the attention of colleagues and media that the bill was not repressive, but, in view of the United States’ Magnitsky Act, very humane.”

“The accounts of officials may be frozen under the Magnitsky Act,” he recalled.

The existence of foreign accounts in other countries is not a crime. But the people who must protect the sovereignty of their country must not depend on other states. They are Russian officials and must protect their country’s sovereignty. It is adequate to our realities,” said the editor-in-chief of the Odnako (However) magazine, Mikhail Leontiev, said.

The editor-in-chief of Expert magazine, Valery Fadeyev, has remarked that in Britain there is no such law, but “the public opinion is so strong that if a candidate proves to have bank accounts in Switzerland, he will have no chances of being elected to parliament.”

“These restrictions are stronger than juridical ones,” he said.

We had an absolute consensus. The law is necessary and important. It is the first step towards creating a nationally oriented elite,” said the chief of the Civil Society Development Fund, Konstantin Kostin, said to round up the meeting.

President Vladimir Putin on February 12 submitted to the State Duma a bill prohibiting civil servants from having bank accounts outside Russia.

As follows from the accompanying memo, all persons who by virtue of their job and professional duty make decisions concerning the questions of sovereignty and national security of Russia, their spouses and children under age are prohibited from opening and having accounts, keeping cash in foreign banks located outside Russia’s territory, owning government securities of foreign states, and bonds and shares of other foreign issuers.

The ban is applicable to persons holding official state positions in Russia, the posts of first deputy and deputies of Russia’s prosecutor-general, seats on the Bank of Russia board of directors, state positions in the constituent territories of Russia and posts in state-run corporations, companies, funds and other organizations, established under federal laws and appointments to which are made by the president, the government or the prosecutor-general, and also to the spouses and children under age.

In case such accounts do exist, the person in question and the family have a three-month deadline for closing the accounts, withdrawing cash from foreign banks and selling up the securities of foreign issuers.