Necessary heirs

The part of the Civil Code (CC) of the Russian Federation deserves high assessment but nevertheless it occurs that its certain regulations do not meet the requirements of equity. For instance, it concerns the legislative regulation establishing a set of people liable to the compulsory portion of the inheritance as well as the conditions of bringing them to succession. According to the law, disabled heirs are considered as necessary ones because due to their age or health they are not capable of taking care of themselves, hence, they loose their right to receive financial support from the testator or the support itself due to his death. Meanwhile the fact of changing the last will of the testator who desired to exclude from the testament persons who are not even capable of working at the moment of the testator's death (but were supported by him for more than a year without his being legally obliged to) in the interests of these persons and in prejudice of the heirs according to the testament is the breach of the freedom of testament principle. The lawmaker's decision not to put in the testament persons liable to alimony, siblings not capable of working being of distant kindred appears to be just. The CC settles the alimentary matters in its succession law section by means of necessary heirs regulation but in the matters of disabled heirs support the degree of kindred as well as their belonging to testator's relatives as such does not count much as for the testator's disabled dependents to recognize their right of the compulsory portion of the inheritance. It seems that relatives farther than the second civil degree as well as persons having no family relationship to the testator except persons who educated and supported him must be excluded from the necessary heirs regardless of their having lived together or not. So but for the relatives of the first civil degree (members of the testator's family) we must consider a disabled ex-marital partner (but under certain circumstances that can be a marital partner and an ex-marital partner regardless of their capability of working) and incapable of working persons liable to receive support while testator's lifetime in some cases. But incapability of working or minority is not considered as a sign of the need for support. But the breach of the testator's will in the interests of persons who have no real need for support doesn't correspond to the function performed by the compulsory portion of the inheritance. Consequently it appears that the changing of the deceased person's will must be done in the interests of persons having the right in conformity with the law to reclaim the support from the testator while alive and being in need of the inheritance property

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