09 June 2004 18:32
Russian Foreign Ministry denies role in investigating British Council
The Foreign Ministry's press office told reporters from the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta that any
problems concerning tax and economic activity at the British Council were between the council and the Ministry of
Internal Affairs, emphasizing that the row does not concern the British embassy. The following is an excerpt from a
report by Dmitriy Simakin and Roman Ukolov headlined "British Council given deadline" in the paper on 8
June:
The British Council, the influential international humanitarian organization with 15 branches on Russian territory,
has come under the gaze of the Russian Federation Ministry of Internal Affairs [MVD]. Lt-Gen Sergey Verevkin-Rakhalskiy,
head of the Russian MVD Federal Service for Economic and Tax Crime (FSENP), said yesterday at a news conference that a
check is under way into the British Council's financial activity.
[Passage omitted: Verevkin-Rakhalskiy told news conference of requirement for British Council to submit financial
reports.]
The interest in the British Council of the "power-wielding structure" is intriguing for several reasons. It
is a humanitarian organization which has a broad network of educational and cultural institutions in many countries
carrying out a range of diverse humanitarian projects. [Passage omitted: variety of language-teaching options on
offer.]
It has become known to your Nezavisimaya Gazeta correspondent from sources in the MVD central apparatus that the
police have been studying the organization's reports for a long time. However, the case has only now been made
public, on the eve of the expiry of the deadline given to the British Council for the submission of documents. We did
not manage to find out any details of the thrust of the MVD's complaints against this organization. At the British
Council's Moscow office yesterday your Nezavisimaya Gazeta correspondent was told that they are a subdivision of
the cultural department of the British embassy in Moscow and advised us to ask the diplomatic mission for
explanations.
The embassy itself said that MVD representatives had visited the British Council's Moscow office and a number of
centres in other Russian cities back on 21 May. "The situation is currently at the negotiations stage," the
embassy told Nezavisimaya Gazeta. "So the British side was very surprised and concerned by the MVD statements. The
British Council is part of the embassy and all laws regulating the diplomatic mission's activity extend to
it."
As for the FSENP head's statement regarding cooperation with the Russian Foreign Ministry in investigating the
British Council's activity, the Russian foreign policy department did not confirm that information. Here is what
Nezavisimaya Gazeta was told by Mikhail Troyanskiy, deputy director of the Russian Foreign Ministry's information
and press department: "This issue relates wholly and entirely to the MVD's sphere of activity. The Foreign
Ministry is not involved in it since in this situation it is not a question of the British embassy. The MVD had a number
of questions for this organization in connection with the payment of taxes. Diplomatic property is one thing, but if
this is not a diplomatic enterprise, so to speak, then its use should probably be taxed in some way. In this situation
it is not a case of any criminal cases but of this organization's status. This enterprise should probably resolve
its problems with the Russian law-enforcement or tax agencies. For its part the Foreign Ministry confirms its favourable
attitude towards Britain and stresses that this situation has absolutely nothing to do with the British embassy."
[Passage omitted: British Council's history]
[Nezavisimaya Gazeta] |
RUSSIA IN FACTS
