MOSCOW. June 14 (Interfax) - Russia's State Duma on Wednesday passed in the first reading a bill outlining legal guarantees for exemption from criminal liability for people who have signed contracts for military service in the Russian Armed Forces in the period of mobilization, during martial law or wartime.
The bill authors are State Duma Legislation and State-Building Committee head Pavel Krasheninnikov, his first deputy Irina Pankina, and Federation Council committee head Andrei Klishas.
Under the bill, guarantees of exemption from liability will apply to specific categories of convicts, and also to people who have committed crimes, in the event of their call-up for military service during mobilization or wartime to the Russian Armed Forces or signing a contract for military service in the Russian Armed Forces in the period of mobilization, during martial law or during wartime.
Subsequent exemption from liability and expungement of conviction will be possible in connection with receiving a state award or in connection with discharge from military service on specific grounds.
Control over such people's behavior until the moment of their exemption from liability will be exercised by the command of military units (establishments), according to the bill.
The bill will take effect on the day of its official publication. Some of its provisions will apply to people who have committed low and medium-gravity crimes before the moment of the bill's entry into force.
Similarly, this applies to convicts whose sentences took legal force before the moment of the bill's entry into force.
Pankina, a co-author of the bill, told Interfax that "the provisions contained in the bill may apply only to those people who committed crimes before its entry into force to prevent the possibility of signing a contract while being in a penitentiary establishment from becoming a motive for citizens' criminal behavior."