MOSCOW, December 25 - RAPSI. A bill adopted by the lower house of Russia’s parliament, which bans US citizens from adopting Russian children, is purely political and is designed to distract public attention from other problems, says a public organization led by ex-finance minister Alexei Kudrin.

“As a result, our country, where the legislative power demonstrates its dependence on the executive branch of power and the current political situation, is losing,” the Civic Initiatives Committee said on its website on Monday.

The Russian State Duma adopted the so-called Dima Yakovlev bill in a third and final reading on Friday. The draft law could come into effect in January once approved by the Federation Council and signed by President Vladimir Putin.

The bill was dubbed after a 21-month-old Russian child who died of heatstroke in July 2008 when his adoptive US father, Miles Harrison, left him unattended in a car for nine hours. Several highly placed Russian officials, including Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, spoke against the adoption of the draft law.

The draft law retaliates for enactment of the Magnitsky Act in the United States, which imposes visa bans and asset freezes on Russian officials deemed guilty of human rights abuses.

Kudrin’s committee said Americans “lose nothing” if the “Dima Yakovlev bill” is adopted because they would then render more significant aid to children from other countries.

“The draft law violates not the rights of American adopters but those of Russian orphans and sick children that our country cannot provide assistance and safety for at this stage,” the organization said. “As a result, Russian children become hostage to political games. First, worthy conditions for children to reside in families inside the country should be achieved, and only then the very possibility of such legislative amendments should be discussed,” it said.

The Civic Initiatives Committee said the controversial bill was an attempt to distract attention from internal problems and stop the decline in public confidence in the authorities.

“But it is impossible to restore trust by using this strange and risky method,” the organization said.

President Putin on Thursday voiced support for the proposed adoption ban and complained bitterly that US authorities do not allow Russian officials to monitor the condition of adoptive children or sit in on court hearings regarding their well-being.

Critics of the proposed “Dima Yakovlev bill” warn that it would seriously hurt disabled children, who, they say, are frequently adopted by foreigners. In 2011, according to government figures, 89 of the children adopted by American families, or about 9 percent, were registered as having disabilities.

While the adoption ban is the most controversial aspect of the proposed legislation, the bill puts forward other retaliatory measures as well, like banning alleged US abusers of Russian citizens’ rights from entering Russia and freezing any assets they may have here.

A longtime member of Valdimir Putin's administration, Kudrin, 51, resigned as finance minister and deputy prime minister last year following a public row with President Dmitry Medvedev over budget issues including rising defense spending.