MOSCOW, July 12 - RAPSI. The Presidential Human Rights Council has drawn up amendments to the draft law on non-profit organizations. In particular, it proposes to substitute the phrase "non-profit organizations fulfilling the functions of a foreign agent" with "non-profit organizations receiving funds from foreign sources for political activity," the council's website reported.

Last Friday, the State Duma adopted in its first reading the draft law on granting Russian non-profit organizations, financed from abroad and involved in politics, a "foreign agent" status. The "agents" will be obliged to be entered into a special register and different legal regulations will apply to them which will not apply to ordinary non-profit organizations. These regulations will stipulate specific accountability and checks.

The draft law proposed by a group of United Russia party members has left many NGO's extremely dissatisfied.

The council has also proposed supplementing a provision on the law with a phrase stating that it will not apply to "legal relations which resulted from the political activity of non-profit organizations, which had been granted funds from foreign sources before the law came into effect."

The State Duma is expected to consider the draft law in the second and third readings at its July 13 session.