A union of Russia's leading publishers and libraries has created an advisory body that will evaluate books for compliance with the country's increasingly repressive laws, business daily Vedomosti reported on Tuesday.

The so-called expert center of the Russian Book Union will make recommendations on individual books, but the final decision on removing books from sale will rest with the publishers, Vedomosti reports.

The think tank's recommendations have already led AST, one of Russia's largest publishers, to announce on Monday it will suspend sales of three books by American authors James Baldwin and Michael Cunningham, as well as Russian postmodernist writer Vladimir Sorokin, that allegedly contain "LGBTQ" content. propaganda,” which is prohibited in Russia.

The three titles appeared on a list of 252 books published by Russian journalists in February amid fears that publishers and major online distributors would pull them from shelves for fear of violating Russia's "LGBT propaganda" law.

In December, AST suspended the printing and sale of books by popular exiled anti-war writers Boris Akunin and Dmitry Bykov.

Vedomosti reported that the Russian Book Union discussed the creation of an expert council with state media watchdog Roskomnadzor in January 2023. The initial idea reportedly involved the Russian Ministry of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Communications, which is responsible for publishing houses, overseeing the activities advice. Job.