The Chechen parliament submitted a draft law to the State Duma that would ban the Russian press from mentioning the nationality and religion of people involved in committing crimes. The bill would also prohibit mentioning whether a criminal belongs to an indigenous group.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The draft legislation proposes amendments to Article 4 of Russia\u2019s Law on Mass Media (Inadmissibility of abuse of freedom of mass information).\u00a0<\/p>\n
An explanatory note says that the amendments were put forward out of a \u201cneed to preserve interethnic and interfaith harmony and peace\u201d in Russia. It also notes that currently, \u201cprovocative materials\u201d appear in the media and on social networks that promote negative attitudes towards certain groups of people, and encourage the restriction of their rights or violence against them.<\/p>\n
The Chechen parliament\u2019s plans to prepare this draft law first became known in early November. This came after Chechnya\u2019s leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, condemned the media for referring to the suspects in an attack on a Moscow resident and his child as \u201cpersons of Caucasian nationality\u201d (the suspects were reportedly from Azerbaijan).\u00a0<\/p>\n