First deputy chairman of the Duma Committee on State Security Mikhail Grishankov (right)
Photo: Dmitry Dukhanin
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Mass Declassification of State Secrets
Parliamentary hearing on improving legislation on state secrets will take place in the State Duma on Tuesday, writes Gazeta newspaper. A package of amendments to federal legislation is likely to be drafted that will result in the most massive declassification of state secrets in Russia since the early 1990s. Heads of federal agencies of executive power will be expected to carry out regular checks on the necessity of maintaining the secret status of archive documents. The transfer of material from status of state secret to that of privileged information will be encouraged.
The Duma will pass a new law on privileged information as well and article 284 of the Criminal Code (“loss of documents containing state secrets”) is to be repealed. No one has been convicted of a violation of article 284 for the last six years.
It is possible that interagency commissions on declassification of the documents of organizations that have ceased to exist will be set up in the regions in the near future. Military organizations would not be subject to the actions of those commissions, since military organizations always have legal successors.
First deputy chairman of the Duma Committee on State Security Mikhail Grishankov stated that the declassification effort might result in the publication of party documents that could refute the Ukrainian claim that the Holodomor famine of the early 1930s was specifically targeted against residents of Ukraine.
In the same package of legislation, penalties for revealing state secrets will be made more severe, and foreign citizens serving in the Russian armed forces will be made liable for state treason. Under current legislation, only Russian citizens can be charged with treason.
www.kommersant.com
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