OREANDA-NEWS. June 15, 2009. Earlier, in course of the inspection, FAS Russia discovered that Rostechnadzor violated Part 1 Article 15 of the Federal Law "On Protection of Competition" by exercising the functions of a federal executive body on accreditation of certification bodies and testing laboratories (centres), which Rostechnadzor was not authorised to perform. Rostechnadzor also violated Article 16 of the Federal Law "On Protection of Competition" by engaging in concerted actions with "Promyshlennaya Bezopasnost" Research and Development Centre OJSC, that lead or can lead to preventing, restricting or eliminating competition, in particular, restricting entry to the market of conformity assessment services, reported the press-centre of FAS Russia.

Based on No.196 Order of 2nd April 2007, Rostechnadzor approved and put into effect the Regulations on the Unified Conformity Assessment System (ES OS Rostechnadzor) at the facilities controlled by the Federal Service for Environmental, Technological and Nuclear Supervision (RD-03-21-2007). The Regulations established special requirements for the organisations involved in conformity assessment of goods, production processes and services.

Also an organisation, wishing to be accredited in ES OS Rostechnadzor, was obligated, upon accreditation, to conclude a contract with the Accreditation Body for information services for the whole period when the Accreditation Certificate is valid. Typically, an accredited organisation had to pay quarterly at least 10% of the completed works to the Accreditation Body, or the sum was fixed depending on the number of accreditation fields.

The Supervisory Council of ES OS Rostechnadzor "appointed" the "Promyshlennaya Bezopasnost" Research and Development Centre OJSC as the Accreditation Body. The latter was not authorised by the Government of the Russian Federation to act in such capacity. "Promyshlennaya Bezopasnost" Research and Development Centre OJSC was fully involved in inspections, assessments, organisation of accreditations and issuing Accreditation Certificates.

It periodically checked the accredited organisations and coordinated activities of all accreditation participants, and represented ES OS Rostechnadzor in the international organisations. Moreover, Promyshlennaya Bezopasnost" Research and Development Centre OJSC was involved in rate making for the works and establishing the procedures for payment for the accreditation work. Those functions are performed by the State Committee of the Russian Federation for Standardization and Metrology (currently the Federal Agency for Technical Regulation and Metrology) as agreed upon with the Ministry of Finances of the Russian Federation.

Executing the FAS Russia's Act, on 1st April 2009 Rostechnadzor sent a letter to report that the Order "On Approving and Putting into Effect the Regulations on the Unified Conformity Assessment System at the facilities controlled by the Federal Service for Environmental, Technological and Nuclear Supervision (RD-03-21-2007)" was deemed to have lost force.

Upon discovering any facts when Rostechnadzor put requests to the certification bodies and testing laboratories (centres), involved in conformity assessment at the facilities controlled by Rostechnadzor, for mandatory certification at the Rostechnadzor Unified Conformity Assessment System (ES OS Rostechnadzor), FAS Russia asks certification bodies and testing laboratories (centres) to inform antimonopoly bodies so FAS Russia can undertake measures of antimonopoly regulation.