Posts Tagged ‘whitehouse’
U.S. Online Petition Calls for Visa Ban on Russian Lawmakers
A petition on the White House website seeking to extend travel restrictions to Russian lawmakers who proposed to ban the adoption of Russian orphans in the U.S. surpassed 25,000 signatures, triggering a review.
Russia’s lower house of parliament, the Duma, proposed the adoption ban in retaliation for a law approved by Congress this month that imposes a visa ban and asset freeze on Russian officials suspected of involvement in the death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky and other human-rights abuses.
Magnitsky, a Russian tax attorney, died in 2009 in a Moscow prison after saying he was abused and denied medical care to force him to withdraw allegations of a $230 million tax fraud by officials.
The web petition to U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration called the Magnitsky law “a profoundly pro- Russian step” in battling corruption and expressed outrage over the Duma proposal, which will “jeopardize the lives and wellbeing” of orphans.
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White House Web Petition Calls For US Blacklisting Of Russian Lawmakers
Over 35,000 people have signed a petition on the White House website urging the enactment of the Magnitsky Act. This would blacklist a majority of Russia’s parliamentarians, who supported a new law banning US citizens from adopting Russian children.
The petition called on the Obama administration to “identify those involved in adopting such legislature responsible under the ‘Magnitsky Act’ and thus included to the relevant list,” arguing that they “breached all imaginable boundaries of humanity, responsibility, or common sense and chose to jeopardize the lives and well-being of thousands of Russian orphans.”
Within nearly 24 hours, the online appeal gathered the number of votes necessary for an official review. Many of the petition’s signatories have names that are apparently Russian, others suggest bot activity.
On Friday, the Russian parliament held the third and final reading to pass legislation dubbed the ‘Dima Yakovlev bill,’ which banned US citizens from adopting Russian children. The law passed with an overwhelming majority: 420 voted in favor, seven against and one abstained.
The new law also targets countries believed to be violating the human rights of Russians, and outlaws US-funded nonprofit political organizations that could threaten Russian interests.
To become a law, the adoption bill must now be approved by the upper house – the Federation Council – and then signed by President Vladimir Putin. The Dima Yakovlev bill was introduced as a direct response to Washington’s Magnitsky Act.
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U.S. Petition On Russian Lawmakers Gains Support
More than 32,000 electronic signatures have been added to an online petition urging the U.S. government to impose sanctions on Russian lawmakers supporting a bill that would ban the adoption of Russian children by Americans.
The petition urges the White House to add the names of legistlators supporting the bill to the list of Russians facing sanctions under the recently adopted Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act.
The White House promises to respond to all petitions that gather more than 25,000 signatures within 30 days of being posted. However, the president is not obligated to take any action.
The petition is being actively promoted on Russian social media sites, and almost all the signatures most likely are those of Russian citizens.
Activist Mikhail Shneider wrote on his Facebook page earlier on December 23:
“The signatures mean that the president is obliged to accept any petition that is signed by at least 25,000 people in 30 days. We have gathered that many in one day…. We continue collecting. There are 40,320 minutes until January 20 [when 30 days expires]. We are now gathering between 30 and 35 signatures a minute. By January 20, we could collect more than 1 million signatures.”
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Magnitsky List Extension Plea Gains Steam
An online petition to make Russian lawmakers, who voted in favor of the US adoptions ban, accountable under the Magnitsky Act, has gained the required number of signatures to be considered by the US administration, the US White House announced on Sunday.
The petition was posted on the White House website on December 21 and has gained the required 25,000 signatures within just two days. By Sunday afternoon, 26,750 people have signed it.
The petition says lawmakers of the lower chamber of the Russian parliament, the State Duma, who approved the ban in the third and final reading on Friday, have “breached all imaginable boundaries of humanity, responsibility, or common sense and chose to jeopardize lives and well-being of thousands of Russian orphans.”
A total of 420 lawmakers voted in favor of the bill, written as a retaliatory response to the US Magnitsky Act, which imposes sanctions on Russian officials accused of human rights violations. The Russian bill is nearly identical. It imposes sanctions on Americans accused of human rights violations, but it also imposes a ban on Americans adopting Russian children.
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