The General Council of the Antimilitarist Radical Association

Moscow, May 19, 1998

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REPORT OF THE TREASURER ANNA ZAJCEVA

Dear friends,

I am very glad to see you all today. We gathered here to take very important decisions and to discuss our position on a number of questions concerning the actual situation with the Alternative civilian service law and some other problems.

In my turn, I would like to report to you, esteemed General Counsellors and members of the ARA Secretariate, on financial and economic activity of our Association in 1997-98.

Within this period we have carried out many important actions and initiatives. Let us remember the "Father Christmas in the Red Square", the so-called "Crusade" against military expenses, the demonstration in the Red Square when the ARA activists lied down forming with their bodies numbers 59.3. - the Article of the Russian Constitution that guarantees the right to conscientious objection - as well as many piquets and meetings, and, certainly, our participation in the elections to the Moscow City Duma.

It goes without saying that we never stopped our everyday activity for informing the conscripts about their right to conscientious objection. In this connection I would like to thank Sakharov Museum and its employees for the possibility to hold consultation seminars in the Museum. We also organize individual consultations and help conscientious objectors in their trials.

In the course of the election campaign to the Moscow City Duma we discovered and tested effective ways of informing people that we adopted in our daily work - as, for instance, pasting stickers in the underground or distributing ARA materials in the places of the accumulation of people. More and more people visit our WEB-site - it is another effective way of speading information. The INTERNET has become a part and parcel of our life and in the future it will be more and more important.

That is what I wanted to say about our activity. In his report the Secretary of the ARA will tell you about it at greater length. Now I would like to dwell on financial aspects of our work.

Below you may see a table with a list of revenues and expenditures. It is evident that membership fees of members and adherents of the ARA, registration fees of participants in the information seminars still remain the main source of revenues. There were also some special contributions, in particular, for the information campagin in the South-West Administration District of Moscow, for the collection of signatures for nominating Nikolaj Khramov for election to the Moscow City Duma and for his election campaign. In 1997 89 people joined ARA as members and 189 as adherents, meanwhile in 1998 there are 37 members and 130 adherents.

As for grants for our activity, unfortunately we did not manage to get them yet. Partly it is my fault and my dereliction. The point is that "procuring grants" takes much time and energy that we can hardly find because of our large-scale work. However, it is thanks to this work that the ARA became famous - recently we were invited to participate in TV and Radio broadcasts, the news summaries often include information about are actions - and maybe this will also help us get grants. However, I suppose (and I hope that you agree with me) that the activity of the Association should first and foremost be financed by those for whom it was established and for whom we work.

As far as expenditures are concerned, I would like to point out that the ARA has never contributed to the rent of the premises, i.d. the Moscow office of the Radical Party, and to the expenses for the e-mail and our WEB-site. However, it should be pointed out that the Association pays the work of secretaries who also work for the Radical Party. The militants of the ARA, its members and adherents prepare and take an active part in all actions of the Radical Party. I would also like to mention that many activists collaborate with us for many years. Among them there are mothers of conscripts, conscripts themselves, their girlfriends and all those who are not indifferent to the destiny of their country and who carry into life our slogan "For the right to life! For the life of the law!".

Hence, taking into account the present situation, I propose the following:

1) do as much as possible to provide support in the form of grants and mini-grants from different Foundations for realisation of our special programs, first of all of the campaign of informing and consulting conscripts and potential conscientious objectors, including our publishing activity;

2) intensify the campaign for drawing in our activity new members and adherents of the ARA.

1997 (thousands of roubles) 1998 (roubles)

Revenues: 105985,17 16653,80

Including:

membership fees: 20010,12 11451,30

special contributions: 78422,00 1800,00

selling information materials: 1077,20 538,50

registration fees: 2052,60 2779,00

other revenue 0,00 75,00

the rest 6397, 98 821,45

Expenditures: 107599,54 25272,68

Including:

office cleaning: 0,00 0,00

telephone: 452,35 1215,58

office keeping: 295,99 444,27

others: 26582,14 1526,50

long-term collaboration: 1967,00 885,00

short-term collaboration: 24048,72 7046,00

translations: 2450,32 882,05

circulation: 18060,80 0,00

stationery: 5366,21 961,40

transport: 6375,48 1057,60

voyages: 554,80 0,00

postal expenses: 11451,71 1001,66

office equipment service: 554,80 0,00

outlay materials: 2419,66 289,80

hotel, restaurant: 909,27 0,00

newspapers and magazines: 0,00 0,00

mineral water, tea and coffee

in the office: 1151,04 565,24

Stickers: 121,80 6732,79