Corrected - Justice Ministry enters Dinastia foundation on foreign agent register
(Correcting "Dinsatia" to "Dinastia" throughout story issued at 8: 44 p.m. on May 25)
MOSCOW. May 25 (Interfax) - Dmitry Zimin's Dinastia noncommercial programs foundation has been entered on the register of foreign-agent nongovernmental organizations, the Justice Ministry's press service reported on Monday.
"In accordance with the federal law on non-commercial organizations, Dmitry Zimin's Dinastia Foundation for Noncommercial Programs has been entered on the register of noncommercial organizations performing foreign agent functions," the press service said.
Facts were uncovered during scheduled document checks by the Justice Ministry's Moscow department, indicating that this organization matches the classification of noncommercial organization, the press service said.
Ten academicians and 18 corresponding members of the Academy of Sciences from among the July 1 Club members, who protested against the Russian Academy of Sciences reform, urged Justice Minister Alexander Konovalov two weeks ago not to enter the Dinastia Charitable Foundation on the register of foreign-agent nongovernmental organizations.
"Zimin was recently awarded the Education and Science Ministry Prize for Patronizing Russian Science. Three months on, an attempt is being made to enter the Dinastia Foundation on the register of the so-called 'foreign agents.' This idea is absurd," says an open letter available to Interfax.
The letter was signed by members of the July 1 Club Vladimir Zakharov, Leonid Keldysh, Alexander Kuleshov, Valery Rubakov, Sergei Stishov, Viktor Vasilyev, Nikolai Kardashev, Alexei Starobinsky, Robert Suris and Alexander Chaplik. It was also signed by 18 corresponding members of the Russian Academy of Sciences, who are members of the Club.
The authors said that the foundation's activities were fully open and generally known, and "have nothing to do with defending the interests of foreign states." It is being financed from Zimin's private resources, even though they arrive from foreign bank accounts, it says.
"We are urging you to take the situation under personal control and to prevent the Foundation's entry on the foreign agents register," the academicians wrote.
The newspaper Vedomosti wrote then that Zimin's private foundation Dinastia, supporting science and education, could be entered on the foreign agent register. Dinastia planned to put 435 million rubles in projects and programs in 2015. Some 352 million rubles was spent for these purposes in 2014 and 328 million in 2013," Vedomosti writes.
