The head of the combined editorial board of RBC Petr Kanaev was summoned to court for quoting “foreign agents”. Five cases have been filed against him

Head of the united editorial office of RBC Petr Kanaev reported on Facebook that he was summoned to court for “quoting foreign agents and mentioning extremist terrorists.” Kanaev said that a total of five cases were opened against him.

According to him, administrative cases were instituted under Article 13.15 Part 2.1 of the Administrative Code. One of them concerns the absent in the text of the marking that the Taliban Movement is recognized as terrorist in Russia. “It doesn’t matter what we ourselves, when we noticed, added it. Simply – “In case of evasion of a summons to court, the person may be brought under arrest.”

“But it is not the Taliban terrorist organization banned in Russia that worries me so much,” Kanaev writes. – As you know, citing foreign agents, even with a corresponding mark, and even more so without, is one of the two required grounds for entering, in fact, into the register of foreign agents. The second reason is the availability of foreign funding. There is room for interpretation here. “

Kanaev noted that the law on “foreign agents” was studied by the legal service of RBC, which explained that the law was vague and unclear. “The current wording of the law does not exclude attribution to foreign funding, including the receipt of money under advertising contracts with foreign brands. And foreign brands advertise everything. “

Kanaev also attached a list of amendments that the combined edition proposes to introduce into the law on “foreign agents”:

1. “Approval of the minimum level of foreign funding for assigning the status of a foreign agent. The goal is to eliminate small provocative payments. The Law on Foreign Agents in its current formulation is intended to “eliminate the influence of foreign funding on the information agenda.” With this one can agree or disagree ideologically. But it is precisely in these formulations that the volume of foreign funding should provide a real opportunity to influence the editorial process, carry out professional activities / implement projects /. In the case of limiting foreign participation in the capital of media companies, the limit is set at 20%. Similarly, you can set a limit on foreign capital in the income of the editorial office at a rate of 20%.
2. Exclusion from the concept of “foreign financing” receipt of funds under contracts for the provision of advertising services. Now the law allows to refer to foreign financing income from advertising of foreign brands. The top 3 largest advertisers in the Russian advertising market in 2020 are PepsiCo, Nestle and Reckitt Benckiser – about one-sixth of all advertising money.
3. Exclusion from the concept of “foreign funding” of international awards. And income from the sale of services to clients abroad. So that the law on foreign agents does not become a de facto ban on the export of intellectual and creative products.
4. To ensure the uniformity of the law, it is necessary to consider the possibility of automatic exclusion of media outlets from the register of foreign agents in an extrajudicial and non-judicial procedure, with a reduction in the term of work without foreign funding to six months. The proposal to shorten the term is related to the specifics of the business cycles of the media market and the budgetary process of the media. Those. if according to the results of 2 consecutive quarters or a calendar half-year (1-6, 7-12 months) in the reports to the RKN from the media there is no indication of foreign funding, on the initiative of the RKN such media is excluded from the register of foreign agents.
5. Eliminate the connection between citing information from media foreign agents with the appropriate labeling and entry into the register. Decisions to publish news are not determined by the source of the information, but by their public relevance. In addition, an incident arises. Allowed to quote any foreign media without consequences and restrictions. And citing the media announced by foreign agents creates the risk of being included in the register. “