Press release of the ARA

Moscow, October 7, 1998

For immediate distribution

STATE DUMA HAS REJECTED THE PROPOSED LAW ON ALTERNATIVE CIVIL EMPLOYMENT. NOW THE QUESTION IS TO BE RESOLVED AT THOUSANDS OF COURTS ALL OVER THE RUSSIA. STATEMENT OF ARA SECRETARY NIKOLAJ KHRAMOV

With 159 votes against 78 the State Duma today has rejected the second reading of the proposed federal law on alternative civilian service. The parliamentary groups of the Communist Party, "Our Home - Russia", Agrarian Group and "People's Power" have voted against it. "Jabloko" and "Russian Regions" have favoured the draft. The Liberal-Democratic Party has evaded from participation in voting.

This draft law, elaborated by the members of former Duma - Malkin and Savitsky, was approved in first reading in December 1994, and then twice - in May and in December 1995 - Duma had sent it back for corrections. Today's voting means that proposed relatively liberal law (which offers the civil type of future alternative service and its term that is 1.5 times more than the military one) is completely abandoned, leaving the space for considering a new projects in their first reading.

Practically, the Duma's Committee of Defense that today has called on deputies to vote against the Malkin - Savitsky draft law, had prepared the another one, signed by general Albert Makashov. Makashov's militaristic bill is adequate to the General Staff's aspirations and essentially represents the rules of punishment conscientious objectors: the term of an alternative service is two times longer than the military, it will be offered only on basis of the proven (!) religious belief, and, the most important, it must be passed in the auxiliary units of the same armed forces.

Concerning the today's voting in Duma, ARA Secretary Nikolaj Khramov has made the following statement:

``Today's discussion and voting, that had passed in absence of representatives from the General Staff or Ministry of Defense, without the Minister of Labour, the Minister of Social Policies, without any representatives from the Government, had shown, as it should had been expected, that none of the Russian authorities need the law on alternative civilian service. Nobody, "except" the millions of Russians of the call-up age and their relatives.

The disposition of votes was also of no surprise. The fact that the red and the colourless have once again unanimously rejected the proposed conscientious objection law that the millions of Russian citizens had waited for, I hope will lead the electorate - first of all, the young - to make the appropriate conclusions until the next year's December. The country should know its heroes.

However, any voting and any militaristic speeches at the Okhotny Ryad cannot abrogate the right to refuse the military service on reasons of conscience that is guaranteed by the direct action of the Constitution. The absence of the alternative civilian service not only leaves the hospitals without attendants, but also the army without soldiers. The number of those who would object the military service and officially request the alternative civilian service instead, who would assert their constitutional right in judicial order and thus don't go to the barracks, is increasing in geometrical progression. During the last year this number had grown from 675 up to 1061, and I hope that the autumn call-up that just had begun will end up with at least 4 thousand. If the current rates of increase will remain the same, by the spring of 2001 the generals will count the absence of more than half of 150 thousand young Russians that they use to call-up each season. All these people then will pass a kind of "alternative se

rvice" in halls of judicial proceedings.

As to us, activists of ARA, we are going in union with other antimilitarist forces to use our best efforts for the maximum expansion of "civil obedience campaign" that we have already started. The final aim of the campaign is 100% conscientious objection of the called-up from the military service and their demand of realization of constitutional guarantees until the law is adopted. Just there, at thousands of courts all over the country, not in the corridors and the plenary hall of Duma, will be finally resolved the fate of the alternative civilian service law, and, in a wider sense, the fate of the liberal military reform in Russia. Tu l'a voulu, Georges Dandin.''

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Antimilitarist Radical Association

Tel./fax: +7 095 923.9127

E-mail: ara@glasnet.ru

http://www.glasnet.ru/~ara