Does Russia Have Laws
Judicial review allows the courts to overturn unconstitutional laws. Constitutional courts are therefore negative legislators. The interpretations of the Constitution in the decisions of the Constitutional Court are also decisive and binding on the political branches. Ordinary or lower courts may also apply judicial review. Ordinary courts may refuse to apply (1) laws that violate the Constitution and (2) normative regulations, especially subordinate regulations that violate laws. The Supreme Court of the Russian Federation is competent to establish the constitutionality of regulations made by government bodies. The Supreme Court has ruled that subordinate courts must evaluate the content of existing laws or other normative acts to ensure their conformity with the Constitution and apply the Constitution if they conflict with each other. But as Putin expanded his power, Russia`s membership in the Council of Europe proved to have a positive impact on the rule of law in Russia. Referring to this second “window” on Russia, Kahn said: “I think history will show that the Council of Europe has done more to advance the rule of law in Russia than any other institution, political circumstance or individual actor.” By allowing Russia to join its club, the Council of Europe risked that Russia`s failure to comply with Council standards would undermine the institution`s credibility.
Another source of the burden turned out to be Russia`s burden on the European Court of Human Rights – Russia now accounts for more than 20% of the court`s indictment. The Rossiyskaya Gazeta (Российская газета) is the daily newspaper that contains official decrees, declarations and documents of state bodies such as the promulgation of newly approved laws, presidential decrees and government orders. Russia`s Supreme Court does not have the power to provide general “explanations” of substantive law and procedural issues, unless there is a relevant “case or controversy.” Lawyers also participate in these discussions, and the opinions of judges and commentators are published and used as persuasive authority. This process is in some ways analogous to the discussion that scholars have in American Law Reports or Law Reviews. [after whom?] Judges and academics can codify what the practice is or, more importantly, address new legal issues to the lower courts and teach them how to interpret those issues. The texts of the declarations of the law are published and cited by many courts. On the other hand, only certain court notices are published. It is not clear which explanations are binding on the lower courts, as there is a tension between the Constitution and federal law over the Guiding Principles. Nevertheless, lower courts that ignore the relevant explanations are likely to be reversed.
The 2017 Law on VPNs and Internet Anonymizers (276-FZ) does not prohibit these proxies. Rather, it aims to prevent proxy services, including VPNs and anonymizers such as Tor or Opera, from granting access to websites banned in Russia. It also prohibits search engines from providing links to such documents. The law allows Roskomnadzor, Russia`s federal executive agency tasked with monitoring online and media content, to block websites with instructions on how to bypass state blocks, including the use of VPNs. It also authorizes Russian law enforcement agencies, including the Interior Ministry and the FSB, to identify violations, and instructs Roskomnadzor to create a special registry of online resources and services banned in Russia. “Laws prohibiting VPNs and anonymizers from facilitating the circumvention of government blocks are part of the continued expansion of government regulations on blocking,” Aleksander Isavnin, an expert on computer and internet regulation, told Human Rights Watch. The 2017 law did not provide for penalties for violations. Sanctions were introduced the following year in amendments to the Code of Administrative Offences.
In April 2018, Roskomnadzor blocked millions of Internet Protocol (IP) addresses in an unsuccessful attempt to block the Telegram messaging service for failing to hand over the user`s encryption keys to Russian security services that Telegram does not own.
