Rights defenders refuse to obey to new law on NCOs

Two leading Russian human rights organizations – the "Memorial" and "For Human Rights" – are not going to refuse from foreign grants, despite the law that assumes the status of "a foreign agent" for non-commercial organizations (NCOs) funded from abroad. Human rights defenders also plan to challenge this law at the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).

The law that introduces the status of "a foreign agent" for the NCOs funded from abroad was adopted by the State Duma on July 13.

"We see nothing criminal and nothing discrediting in the fact of obtaining grants from completely legitimate foreign organizations," the RIA "Novosti" quotes Oleg Orlov, a board member of the HRC "Memorial".

Mr Orlov has emphasized that his organization will not get voluntarily register as a foreign agent and will counteract the "discriminatory practices" by legal methods.

Lev Ponomaryov, the leader of the movement "For Human Rights", has announced "a campaign of civil disobedience to the law." He did not exclude that the activists of his movement would appeal to the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation and the ECtHR, should they be held responsible for disobedience to the law, the "Gazeta.ru" writes.

Lyudmila Alekseeva, the head of the Moscow Helsinki Group, plans to devise a scheme of fundraising on human rights activities through the Internet. She has admitted that her organization will have to abandon a number of educational and monitoring programmes, the "Forbes" reports.