The Duma took care of the belligerents and traders – Newspaper Kommersant No. 207 (7408) dated 11/09/2022

The State Duma on Tuesday adopted two regular bills, one way or another related to the special military operation (SVO). The deputies were the first to extend the status of a combat veteran to volunteers participating in the special operation. The second bill is aimed at the speedy inclusion in the Russian legal field of organizations and individual entrepreneurs operating in new territories.

A bill on extending the status of a combat veteran to volunteers participating in the NVO was submitted to the Duma on November 3 by a group of 294 deputies and seven senators, headed by speakers of the State Duma and the Federation Council Vyacheslav Volodin and Valentina Matviyenko. Presenting the document at the meeting, one of its many co-authors, the head of the Duma Committee on Industry and Trade, Vladimir Gutenev (United Russia), explained that we are talking about volunteers who “contribute to the fulfillment of the tasks assigned to the armed forces of the Russian Federation during the NMD on the territory Ukraine, Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics starting from February 24 and in the territory of Kherson and Zaporozhye regions from September 30. The document also establishes the status of a combat invalid for those volunteers who were injured, shell-shocked, mutilated during the SVO, and, accordingly, extends all veteran benefits to them, United Russia explained.

One of the benefits is a 50 percent compensation for the payment of housing for veterans, the disabled and family members living with them.

Mr. Gutenev also cited data from the Ministry of Defense on the number of volunteers – about 16 thousand people. “Additional costs for the implementation of the bill may amount to 750 million rubles. per year,” he said.

Fedot Tumusov (“A Just Russia – For the Truth”), who is also a co-author of the bill, raised the issue of conscripts who, due to a command error, also took part in the SVO at its first stage (later, as the Ministry of Defense assured, all conscripts were withdrawn from the zone of special operation). Vladimir Gutenev replied that the proposal to equate such military men with veterans “has the right to life, but not within the framework of this bill.”

Aleksey Kurinny (KPRF) drew attention to the fact that the draft law refers to “persons who entered the volunteer formations created by decision of the state authorities of the Russian Federation.” “But what about the militias who fought from the very beginning, from February 24, when there were no state authorities in that territory, but there were volunteers?” the communist asked. Mr. Gutenev explained that until September 30 (that is, before the signing of agreements on the inclusion of new subjects in the Russian Federation), the territories of the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions were under the jurisdiction of Ukraine and the local volunteers fighting there were also Ukrainian citizens.

Recallthat in the summer the State Duma also gave the status of veterans of military operations to civilians – doctors, technical specialists, etc. involved in performing tasks during the NWO in Ukraine.

In addition, the Duma on Tuesday adopted in the first reading a bill on ensuring the participation of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs operating in the DPR, LPR, Kherson and Zaporozhye regions in Russian civil circulation. Its authors were the chairmen of the Legislation Committees of the State Duma and the Federation Council Pavel Krasheninnikov and Andrey Klishas. As Mr. Krasheninnikov (United Russia) explained to the deputies, the document is aimed at including legal entities operating in new territories in the economic and civil circulation, at determining the status of individual entrepreneurs and at “determining the legal regime of transactions concluded in these territories before their inclusion in composition of the Russian Federation”. There are more than 30 thousand such legal entities, according to the head of the committee. He also noted that before the entry of new territories into Russia, there were organizational and legal forms that were not provided for by Russian law: for example, a small joint venture or a private joint-stock company. At the same time, Pavel Krasheninnikov explained what to do if the legal entity does not want to enter Russian jurisdiction: “Yes, there is such an opportunity, in this case there are several options – to become a branch or representative office of a foreign legal entity or to cease its activities in the territory of the Russian Federation.”

According to the draft, information about the legal entities of the new territories must be included in the Russian unified state register of legal entities by December 31, 2022.

If legal entities are located in the territories of the DPR and LPR, then they will have to bring their constituent documents in line with Russian legislation when making changes to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities for the first time before December 31, 2023, and if in the territories of Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, then before June 30, 2024.

As a result, the bills on volunteers and legal entities were approved in the first reading unanimously – by 409 and 404 votes, respectively. The deputies are planning to adopt both documents in the second and third, final reading this week.

Ksenia Veretennikova