MOSCOW, January 09. /ITAR-TASS/. A bill on criminal liability of terrorists’ close relatives, initiated by MP Roman Khudyakov of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR) parliamentary faction, was submitted to the State Duma, the lower house of parliament, on Thursday.
Khudyakov suggested amending the Russian Criminal Code with a new clause making the close relatives of the individuals committing terrorist acts liable to criminal responsibility. In accordance with the amendments, in case a crime against public security is committed, the offender’s close relations shall be subjected to criminal responsibility even after his or her death.
Earlier, Liberal Democratic Party of Russia proposed to introduce criminal responsibility for the members of terrorists’ families and to tighten up punishments for the accomplices of terrorism, MP Igor Lebedev, a deputy speaker of the State Duma said.
He indicated, however, that the LDPR faction in the Duma was against the proposals to hold a parliamentary inquiry into the acts of suicide bombing committed at the end of last month in the southern Russian city of Volgograd where 34 people died.
“We’re legislators and we shouldn’t interfere,” Lebedev said. “On the contrary, it’s important now to give the law enforcers full freedom of action in these circumstances so that they could investigate and, what’s most importantly, prevent the terrorist acts.”
He recalled Russia’s role of a country that was to receive the 22nd Winter Olympic Games in Sochi. “I don’t rule out that these terrorist acts in Volgograd are meant at destabilizing the situation in this country on the eve of that grandiose event,” Lebedev said.
Simultaneously, he expressed the LDPR leadership’s opinion on the importance of tightening the punishments for the relatives and accomplices of terrorists.
“We’ve come up more than once with proposals to introduce the harshest possible measures against the terrorists’ relatives,” Lebedev said. “Also, there’s a need to make the punishments for their accomplices and for everyone involved in the organization of terrorist acts really tough.