Before 1998, the Russian Federation did not have a comprehensive export control law, inheritance from the Soviet Union, in which legal basis for many things was unclear or secret. The legal basis for export control procedures rested on several presidential decrees, government resolutions and a federal law on state regulation of foreign economic activity (1995). From 1992 to 1997 Russia developed control lists for missile, biological, chemical, nuclear and dual-use related items and issued regulations governing the export of these items. At the time, Russian exporters of controlled items were required to obtain two licenses, one from the Federal Service for Currency and Export Control (VEK, under the authority of the Ministry of Defence), and another from the Ministry of Trade. Since 3 July 1998 (the date on which the State Duma adopted a comprehensive federal law on 'Military-Technical Cooperation of the Russian Federation with Foreign States'), the only body competent to deliver