MOSCOW, March 31 (RAPSI) – Top managers of Russian companies partially owned by the government won't have to disclose their income publicly, Kommersant newspaper reported on Tuesday, citing a government decree.

The government proposed amending legislation to require that income declarations be publicly submitted by top managers of non-profit and publicly funded organizations, state corporations and companies that are wholly owned by the government.

Executives of business entities are not public employees but businesspersons, the newspaper quotes Natalya Timakova, the press secretary of Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, as saying.

The fact that the state owns a stake in such a business entity does not change its status, she said.

Top managers of these entities will be required to file their income reports directly to the government, which will keep the information confidential, Timakova added.

Non-profit and publicly funded companies are financed directly from the budget and hence their executives are required to declare their incomes publicly, according to Timakova.