The State Duma proposes to protect Russian Donbass volunteers from criminal prosecution in the Russian Federation
Moscow - Kyiv, June 30 (Navigator, Mikhail Stamm) - State Duma deputies from the LDPR Yaroslav Nilov and Andrey Svintsov prepared a bill to amend Part 3 of Art. 359 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation “Mercenarism”. The new edition of the criminal article will remove from the concept of “mercenary” fighters who fight for personal convictions, and not for money, Izvestia writes.
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A change in the concept of “mercenary” is proposed in connection with the events in the Donetsk and Lugansk self-proclaimed republics, where among the people’s militia one can meet Russian citizens who voluntarily, based on their convictions, went to protect the population of the unrecognized republics.
Currently, Part 3 of Art. 359 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation determines that “a mercenary is a person who acts for the purpose of receiving material remuneration and is not a citizen of a state participating in an armed conflict or hostilities, does not reside permanently on its territory, and is not a person sent to perform official duties.” .
With this interpretation, according to legislators, those who cannot be called mercenaries may also fall under the provisions of the article. Moreover, the definition of “mercenary” will also include combatants whose main mission is to protect the civilian population, and not to obtain material benefits.
Based on this, parliamentarians proposed supplementing the definition of the concept of “mercenary” with the following paragraph: “A mercenary is not recognized as a person who does not pursue selfish goals, acts out of inner conviction, on his own initiative in the protection of the civilian population, refugees, and also protects medical personnel, personnel providing humanitarian assistance, journalists and media representatives and other persons not participating in hostilities and located in a zone of armed conflict or hostilities.”
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