Nationalities Agency Wants New Law Requiring Federal Subjects to React to Warnings of Problems in the Ethnic and Religious Area within Three Hours

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 22 – The Federal Agency for Nationality Affairs has prepared a new draft law that would require all federal subjects to react within three hours to notifications from the country’s monitoring network that there is a danger of ethnic or religious conflict on their territories.

            In the past, agency head Igor Barinov says, regional officials have reacted in a “formal” way rather than taking action to the roughly 80 such notifications the monitors send out each day and thus allowing small problems to grow into large ones (nazaccent.ru/content/41545-fadn-predlozhit-obyazat-regiony-reagirovat-na-opovesheniya-o-mezhnacionalnyh-konfliktah.html).

            Because the imposition of such a requirement will place additional burdens on regional administrations, Barinov continues, his agency is ready, willing and able to provide expertise to them as to what steps to take in response to such notifications.

            What makes this proposal worth noting is that it provides yet another example of the ways in which the Putin regime is decentralizing responsibility while increasing centralization as far as control is concerned, a reminder that decentralization to be effective must involve more than just giving federal subjects greater responsibilities.