Appeal against court of arbitrage ruling on tax payment by PEN-centre to be considered on March 27

The appeal of the Russian office of the international organization of writers and poets PEN-club (Russian PEN-centre) against the decision of Moscow court of arbitrage to the effect that the PEN-centre must pay to the Tax Inspectorate about 2,000,000 roubles as a tax for the land occupied by the building of the centre, is appointed to be considered on March 27 in Moscow's 9th appellate court of arbitrage. This has been reported to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent by deputy general director of the Russian PEN-centre today.

As reported earlier, Alexander Tkachenko, head of the PEN-centre, considers the claim of the Tax Inspectorate ungrounded since his organization is not an owner or a lease-holder of the land. He is sure that the true reason for the claim is in the "political independence" of the organization, reports radio "Liberty."

Last November, the Russian PEN-centre published a statement containing sharp critics of amendments to the law on non-government and public organizations. "The law, if it is passed, will lead Russia to isolationism and incapability to work in the international legal space which we already share with democratic countries... In our view, it may be detrimental for the maturing of the civil society," the statement runs.

The Russian PEN-centre executive committee includes Liudmila Ulitskaya, Alexander Gorodnitskiy, Evgeniy Bunimovich, Igor Irteniev and others. Writer Andrei Bitov is the organization's president.

For reference, President Putin signed the notorious law on non-profit public organizations (NPОs) on January 10.

The law strengthens state control over the activity of public organizations in Russia. It also prohibits opening offices and branches of foreign non-government organizations on the territory of closed administrative territorial units. The authorities may refuse registration to any public committee or organization if they do not like it or if its targets, tasks and forms of activity, in the opinion of functionaries, may run counter to the Constitution and the federal legislation. The financial supervision over the activity of non-profit organizations, including foreign ones, will be exercised by the Rosregistratsiya (registering) agency. However, this supervision is going to be indirect, via the tax service and the financial monitoring agencies. Audits should be conducted maximum once a year.

Despite the fact that the law caused sharp criticism both in Russia and in the West, the State Duma passed it in its third reading on December 23, and the Council of the Federation followed suit.

Active protests against the draft law have been undertaken by civil society activists in Voronezh, Samara, Archangelsk, Rostov, Ryazan, Kirov, Vladimir, Moscow, St-Petersburg, Ekaterinburg, towns of Saratov, Pskov, Chelyabinsk and Kemerovo Regions, in Chuvashia, Karelia and other Russian regions.

On November 10, the "Human Rights in Russia" internet portal (hro.org) started an action to collect signatures under the statement of non-government organization "No to strengthening control over civil society!" More than five thousand civil society activists have signed the statement against the law which deteriorates the situation of the NGOs. The statement was initiated by the Democracy and Human Rights Development Centre, the "Memorial" centre, the "Demos" centre, the Russian Union of Committees of Soldiers' Mothers, the Moscow Helsinki group, the Socio-environmental Union, the Institute of the "Public Agreement" national project, and a number of other leading Russian NGOs.