Legislation in question: paragraph 1 of Article 3 of the Federal law “On Making Changes in Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation with Respect to Realisation of Measures for Increasing the Prestige and Attractiveness of  Military Service by Conscription”

Legal issue: The Constitutionality of the rule according to which a citizen of the Russian Federation may not be in the civil service once he earlier evaded conscription.

Ratio decidendi:  The Constitutional Court pointed out that the failure to serve obligatory military service without legal grounds may put into question the ability of such citizen to bear the duties of civil service responsibly and in good faith. In this regard the contested rule does not contradict the Constitution. At the same time, it should not extend to citizens who as of 1 January 2014 have already been transferred to the reserve because this rule is addressing only citizens subject to military service by conscription.

However, this rule does not conform to the Constitution in the sense that it is essentially a lifelong prohibition to hold certain offices, because it puts the persons of the given category in a worse position as compared to those citizens upon whom the prohibition against holding such offices was imposed as a punishment for commission of an administrative offence or crime (according to the legislation, for the latter category of persons such prohibition is limited by term).