25 September 2024
Thanks to the presidential administration turning down proposed legislation on “insulting the authorities”, we can still get away with a joke or two
by Leonid Nikitinsky
Source: Novaya Gazeta
The 7th (autumn) session of the 8th Russian State Duma was not without its hitches.
Vasily Piskarev, the head of the committee on Safety and Anti-Corruption, stated that the government had approved his proposed set of amendments to Article 319 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation on “insulting the authorities”. According to “a document available to TASS”, a second clause to Article 319 was proposed regarding the use of media outlets and the internet, with misuse incurring up to two years’ imprisonment (compared to the present maximum sentence of one year of correctional labour).
Information pertaining to this was published on TASS’ website at 1:11am on September 24th, and a similar post was made on Kommersant’s website at 1:53am. However, these reports stated that the amendments proposed were about increasing liability for “the slander of government representatives”, which would concern a different article of the Russian Criminal Code entirely. Kommersant even expanded upon this, stating that “the government had approved” proposed legislation on increasing accountability for armed rebellion and involving minors in unlawful activities, and whilst it considered the project on liability for Childfree propaganda to be crude, it supported adding property confiscation to the criminal sentence for “organisers of illegal migration”. This “norm” will affect Obninsk resident Tatiana Kotlar, and will target only a single flat which she inherited from her mother.
This spread of proposed legislation certainly looks appetising, but something went awry with the most spine-chilling of them all – that on “insulting the authorities”. Here is a screenshot from the TASS website, which I accessed at 9:00am on September 25th.
Here is a screenshot of what the same web address produced an hour later:
Chair of the State Duma Vyacheslav Volodin contradicted what his colleague Piskarev had said, declaring that no such propositions were made in the Duma. From what we have managed to dig up, this was first mentioned at 4:12pm on 24 September by the national news agency. A short while later Vedomosti were able to contact Dmitry Peskov, who explained that “insults are not the same as criticism, the latter of which the government cannot avoid”.
This story is a strange one, with neither the chair of the State Duma’s safety and anti-corruption committee nor the news agency TASS correcting their blunder, leaving them looking rather stupid. What does this reveal?
- Firstly, the bizarre web of government schemes which do not always fall in line with the presidential administration.
- Secondly, the working relationship between the Duma and the media. Nobody contacted Piskarev at 1:00am; these are all leaks which couldn’t wait until the morning for some reason.
So, what is to become of the proposed legislation on “insulting the authorities”, which despite not being brought forward to the Duma is still lurking in the eaves? What does it matter to us? The authorities already have more than enough weapons to fight their war on “criticism”.
Translated by Friedrich Berg
