MOSCOW, October 12 - RAPSI. The Federal Chamber of Lawyers has requested the Justice Ministry to permit defense attorneys to enter the courts using their official ID cards, the chamber told RAPSI.

The chamber's president Evgeny Semyanko, who filed the application to Deputy Minister of Justice Yelena Borisenko, believes that the legal community is becoming increasingly concerned with the growing number of cases where defense lawyers are denied access to courts despite producing their lawyer's ID cards.

Semenyako said that the Federal Bailiffs Service consider a lawyer ID card confirmation of a lawyer's legal status, but not an identification document. For this reason, defense lawyers may only be admitted into the court building by showing their passports.

Semenyako believes that the bailiffs are mistaken in their position, since the Supreme Court ruled on November 8, 2006, that a document constitutes an ID if it contains all the essential details needed to identify a person. A driver's license, for example, meets this description.

"The lawyer ID card meets all the requirements of an identification document," Semenyako said.

He has therefore requested the ministry to explain the status of this ID card to the bailiffs and instruct them accordingly.