OREANDA-NEWS. On April 21, 2009 the Committee of Civil, Criminal, Arbitration and Procedural Legislation of the State Duma of the Russian Federation approved the draft Federal Law "On Introducing Amendments to Article 178 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation", reported the press-centre of FAS Russia.

"We are please with the Committee's decision. Tightening the punishments for violations of the antimonopoly legislation is aimed primarily against cartels that inflict tremendous damages to the national economy. We hope that, together with turnover penalties and disqualification of officials and top managers of the companies, it will become an effective measure in our fight against the violators of the law", - said Igor Artemyev, the Head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia).

The new version of 178 Article 178 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation is one of the major initiatives of the "second antimonopoly package", forwarded by the Government of the Russian Federation for consideration of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation.

FAS Russia has developed the project in order to ensure the principle of inevitability of punishment for socially dangerous violations of the antimonopoly legislation and provide a realistic possibility of enforcement of the provisions of Article 178 by the law enforcement bodies.

The law introduces criminal liability for preventing, restricting or eliminating competition by entering in competition-restrictive agreements or engaging in competition-restrictive concerted actions, repeatedly abusing dominant position by fixing and maintaining monopolistically high goods prices, unreasonably refusing to sing or avoiding entering into a contract, or restricting market entry, if such actions inflicted large damages upon individuals, organizations or the state, or gaining large profit. According to the draft law, large damages mean damages that exceed a million Rubles, and lаrge profit means the profit exceeding five million Rubles.

Under Clause 4 of the Notes to the new version of Article 178 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, a person is engaged in repeated actions if this person has committed more that twice such actions within three years for which the person was made administratively liable.

The law introduces criminal punishments by imprisonment from a year to seven years if the actions for preventing, restricting or eliminating competition were associated with violence or a threat of violence.