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President's Decree No. 302 “On some measures to regulate the activity of public funds” has significantly changed the terms of registration and activity for this sort of non-governmental organisations in Belarus.
Registration procedures have been toughened up, and control of funds’ activity has been strengthened, as well as some extra limitations which have been imposed on their activity.
Firstly, the decree transferred the registration duties to the Ministry of Justice and classified funds as local, republican, and international. Republican funds have to establish their branches and representative offices in at least four regions of the republic, and accordingly, international funds have to have branches abroad.
The registration fee is going to increase greatly too. Now for local funds it is 10 basic units (more than $ 100), for republican and international funds it is 25 basic units. Moreover, there is a property qualification to meet now, which is 100 basic units for local fund and 1000 basic units for republican or international funds. So, if a fund at some point allows its property value to go below the specified minimum it is liable for liquidation.
The decree also significantly reduces the list of purposes that funds can be established for. For instance, a fund has no right to finance any activities that investigate or express people’s political will.
The decree put a moratorium on fund registration until September 1, 2005 – the day when the new document will be validated. All existing funds will have to undergo a registration by February 1.
Source: Belarus-Today, No.27 (301), 19-25 July, 2005.
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