Duma rejects bill on testing govt officials, parliamentarians for drugs
MOSCOW. Dec 10 (Interfax) - The Russian State Duma has turned down a bill under which government officials, Federation Council members, and State Duma deputies would have to be tested for drug addiction.
The bill was proposed by Oleg Nilov and Alexander Burkov of the faction of the party A Just Russia.
The bill proposed conducting mandatory medical tests for federal and regional government officials, Federation Council members, State Duma deputies, members of regional government bodies, and others to determine whether they take narcotic or psychotropic substances.
Such tests were to be planned or unplanned for serving officials or lawmakers and were to be mandatory for candidates before taking office, the bill says.
If such a test proved positive, this could serve as grounds for terminating the relevant powers, relieving an official of their duties, not appointing a candidate to a certain position, and preventing an individual appointed to a certain position from taking office, as proposed by the bill's authors.
The bill has been withdrawn from the Duma's agenda.