Five years passed between the first (2001) and second (2006) World Congresses of Compatriots. 
Presumably, this time was spent considering how to organise the ‘compatriots’ and on the first, rather unsuccessful attempts at such organisation. Chronologically, the Co-ordinating Council of Russian Compatriots was preceded by the International Council of Russian Compatriots (ICRC), established in 2002. As stated on the ICRC’s website, in his speech at the First Congress, ‘the President of the Russian Federation, V. V. Putin, noted the fragmentation of the Russian diaspora and the weakness of its organisations, and called for ways to be found to consolidate the Russian diaspora and strengthen its ties with Russia.
The Congress participants, endorsing the Russian President’s idea, formed an initiative group from among their ranks comprising representatives from 17 countries, which set about working out the practical details of establishing an international association of compatriots. These steps effectively marked the first steps towards the creation of the International Council of Russian Compatriots. On 2 October 2002, with the assistance of the Moscow City Government, a meeting of this group was held, at which a decision was taken to establish a new international public association under the name ‘International Council of Russian Compatriots’ (ICRC). The founding meeting adopted an Appeal to civil society organisations of Russian compatriots abroad, inviting them to cooperate and become members of the ICRC. This date marked its founding. On 10 October 2003, the ICRC was registered with the Russian Ministry of Justice.”  Organisations of ‘compatriots’ that already existed at that time in various countries became members of the ISRC. 
The first meetings of the ISRC in 2003 were held in Cyprus (Larnaca) and in Moscow. 
Vadim Vasilyevich Kolesnichenko, a former member of the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada for the Party of Regions who emigrated to Russia following the occupation of Crimea and became a member of the ‘Rodina’ party, was appointed Chairman of the MSRS Presidium. The Honorary Chairman of the Presidium is Count Pyotr Sheremetev, a long-standing agent of Moscow living in Paris. The Deputy Chairman is Prince Nikita Lobanov-Rostovsky (England), also a long-standing ‘friend’ of the USSR. Until his resignation in 2010, the Honorary Chairman of the MSRS was the Mayor of Moscow, Yuri Luzhkov. In 2007, it was announced that a skyscraper – the MSRS headquarters – would be built in Moscow by 2010. Apparently, this was linked to some financial scam that never came to fruition.  The MSRS’s executive body is the secretariat, which previously consisted of five people with educational backgrounds typical of secret service personnel (the Institute of Oriental Languages at Moscow State University, the Faculty of Oriental Studies at Moscow State University, MGIMO, and the Diplomatic Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs). Currently, there is no biographical information about the members of the secretariat on the MSRS website.
Following Luzhkov’s resignation, the MSRS’s international activities have declined, although various events continue to be held to this day and the website remains operational.