Posts Tagged ‘interpol’
Russia Leverages Western Courts To Chase Wealthy Fugitives
On a balmy morning in August, Janna Bullock steered a light-blue convertible into the driveway of her oceanfront mansion in the swanky hamlet of Southampton on New York’s Atlantic Coast. Waiting for her was a man bearing a stack of documents.
Bullock, a prominent Manhattan-based real estate tycoon and socialite, accelerated toward the house, hopped out of the car and hustled for the door. The man gave chase and touched her with the documents, saying she’d been served with legal papers, according to a U.S. federal court affidavit.
The documents, part of a civil action lodged against Bullock by state-owned Russian banking giant Gazprombank, fell to the steps in front of the sprawling home and remained there as Bullock sequestered herself inside.
From the gilded shores of the Hamptons and the French Riviera to the London stomping grounds of the super-rich, Russia is pursuing ex-officials and entrepreneurs like Bullock who amassed wealth in Russia and then fled the country after falling afoul of powerful officials.
And despite Moscow’s chilled relations with the West over the Ukraine crisis, these efforts in recent months have yielded several favorable rulings for Russia in U.S. and European courts.
The targets of these legal campaigns claim they are victims of a corrupt Russian state, though some critics say they are merely assuming the mantle of political refugees to protect illicit gains purloined in murky business dealings.
Read More →
Facebook
Twitter
Google Buzz
LinkedIn
del.icio.us
Google Bookmarks
Yahoo! Buzz
Tumblr
StumbleUpon
FriendFeed
NewsVine
Digg
Interpol Said To Eye New Russian Bid For Browder’s Arrest
Britain-based businessman William Browder says the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) will revisit Russia’s request for his arrest on charges linked to whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky, who died in a Moscow jail five years ago this week.
Interpol informed Browder that it will consider the request during a November 20-21 meeting at the organization’s headquarters in Lyon, France, he told RFE/RL.
Interpol has twice rejected earlier Russian requests for a so-called “red notice” against Browder, citing Russia’s “political” goals in the matter.
Russian prosecutors said in June that Interpol had decided to reconsider Russia’s request.
Interpol could not immediately be reached for comment.
Browder has led a global campaign for sanctions against Russian officials implicated in Magnitsky’s death on November 16, 2009.
A Russian court convicted Browder in absentia and Magnitsky posthumously on tax evasion charges last year, decisions slammed by Western governments and rights groups.
Browder told RFE/RL that the basis for Russia’s new push for an Interpol warrant against him is linked to Magnitsky’s posthumous trial, which he called “one of the most scandalous legal proceedings in legal history.”
“It’s surprising that Russia would have the nerve to use this as a basis to have me arrested, and it’s even more surprising that Interpol would even entertain this discussion,” Browder said.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
Fair Trials International group urges reforms for Interpol arrests
The case of a Russian environmental activist who fled the country but was later arrested, despite finding sanctuary in Finland, reveals how political motives can sometimes improperly influence international police work, a London-based group said this week.
The international police network in question is Interpol, which represents 190 member countries, including the United States, allowing them to issue international warrants or request information about suspects facing criminal charges at home.
Fair Trials International, an advocacy group for those arrested abroad, issued a report early Thursday asserting that the agency is used by some of its members — including Russia, Belarus, Turkey, Iran and Venezuela — to pursue political ends.
Pyotr Silaev, a 28-year-old Russian who took part in a protest in Moscow in July 2010 against the destruction of a forest in the suburb of Khimki, illustrates how Interpol can be wrongly used, according to Robert Jackman, a Fair Trials spokesman.
When police began arresting some of the demonstrators and accused Silaev of hooliganism, he fled to Finland, which accepted him as a political refugee.
Later, Silaev traveled to Spain and was arrested there on a Russian request issued through Interpol. He spent eight days in prison and six months stuck in Spain while fighting extradition to Russia. A Spanish court eventually refused to extradite him, ruling that his arrest was politically motivated. Fair Trials is trying to get his name stricken from the Interpol database.
When Moscow police wanted Interpol help to arrest William Browder, the investment banker who campaigned for the United States to punish Russia for human rights abuses, Browder quickly found a way to give the international agency his side of the story.
Interpol promptly declared the request to locate Browder — who fought for passage of the U.S. Magnitsky Act — politically motivated and deleted the entry from its database. Browder’s situation showed that individuals are shielded from abuse by Interpol, according to Ronald K. Noble, the agency’s head.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
Rogue states: Cross-border policing can be political
FOUR years ago this week the whistle-blowing accountant Sergei Magnitsky died in jail from beatings and abuse, having uncovered a $230m fraud against the Russian state. His client Bill Browder, a London-based financier, has been campaigning to punish those responsible with visa bans and asset freezes. But the Russian authorities have retaliated and are trying to extradite him on fraud charges, using Interpol, the world police co-operation body.
No Western country is likely to send Mr Browder to Moscow. But his travel plans are stymied by the risk of arrest . He had to cancel a visit to Sweden last month to talk to a parliamentary committee. Only after weeks of lobbying did the country’s police remove Mr Browder from their database. Germany, France and Britain have also publicly snubbed Russia’s request.
Interpol notes that its constitution prohibits “activities of a political, military, religious or racial character”; governments are not supposed to use it to settle scores with their opponents. Nevertheless its “Red Notices”, which seek the discovery and arrest of wanted persons for extradition, are open to abuse. Once issued, a Red Notice encourages—though it does not oblige—190 countries to detain the person named. 8,136 were given out last year, an increase of 160% since 2008. Interpol insists that it is not a judicial body: “queries” concerning allegations are “a matter for the relevant national authorities to address”.
But Mr Browder’s case is just one of many arousing controversy. Three years ago Algeria issued a Red Notice against Henk Tepper, a Canadian potato farmer, in a row involving export paperwork and suspect spuds. He was released in March after a year in a Lebanese jail and wants to sue the Canadian government for not protecting his rights. Interpol took 18 months to accept that the Red Notice issued against Patricia Poleo, a Venezuelan investigative journalist, by her government was politically motivated. Indonesia pursued Benny Wenda, a West Papuan tribal leader who ended up marooned in Britain; Belarus hounded an opposition leader, Ales Michalevic, when he fled to Poland.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
What’s Going on at Interpol?
Despite some dubious alumni, Interpol is, in theory, a good thing, but in practice it appears to be being abused by at least one of its members (clue: a very large country, name beginning with an “r” and run by a former secret policeman), and, oh yes, by the Soviet nostalgics over in Minsk too. Writing in European Voice, Edward Lucas notes:
[Western countries] should help Bill Browder, a London-based financier who is Magnitsky’s former client and champion [Sergei Magnitsky was an accountant who died in Moscow in circumstances that were murky and all too clear]. He risks arrest when he leaves the UK because Russia is shamelessly abusing the Interpol system, claiming that Browder is a wanted fraudster. EU countries should all say that they regard this as political persecution and have no intention of acting on it. That would give Browder safe passage.
Then there’s this, from Russian-untouchables.com:
When Petr Silaev, a Russian journalist, got political asylum in Finland in April 2012 after escaping a crackdown in his home country, he felt safe and began a new life. But in August the same year, he found himself handcuffed and shoved face-down on the floor of a police car on a seven-hour trip from Granada, Spain, where he went on holiday, to a detention centre in Madrid, where he risked extradition.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
Sanctions refused against Russians
Sweden has refused to grant safety guarantees to a London-based businessman who has been lobbying Stockholm and other European capitals to impose sanctions and an asset freeze against some 60 Russian officials.
William Browder, co-founder of the investment fund Hermitage Capital, has been leading a campaign to punish the Russian officials for their part in the arrest, and death in custody in 2009 of his former associate Sergei Magnitsky.
The Russian lawyer blew the whistle on a $230 million embezzlement fraud. After his death, the Russian authorities bizarrely put Mr Magnitsky on posthumous trial and found him guilty of embezzlement. Mr Browder was also sentenced to jailed in absentia at the same trial.
Moscow promptly activated an Interpol arrest warrant against Mr Browder — hence his nervousness about travelling abroad and exposing himself to a possible extradition request. Britain has rejected Russia’s attempts to have Mr Browder brought to Moscow to serve his nine-year sentence.
“The Swedes say it is a police matter and the Government has no right to interfere,” said Mr Browder, who has been successfully persuading European Union governments to freeze the foreign assets of the Russian officials. “But this is a straightforward political decision to ensure that I don’t get arrested at Russian behest. The Germans and the Netherlands gave guarantees. This suggests that the Swedes are afraid of upsetting Russia.”
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
Sweden Won’t Guarantee Russia Critic Against Extradition
London-based investor William Browder cancelled a trip to brief Sweden’s parliament on his sanctions campaign against Russia after the justice ministry refused to protect him from Russian charges Interpol says are politically motivated.
Sweden’s parliament has cancelled a briefing on potential sanctions against Russian officials accused of corruption after the campaign’s leader, London-based investor William Browder, was refused safe passage by the country’s justice ministry.
Browder, once a major foreign investor in Russia, was sentenced in absentia to nine years in prison by a Moscow court this summer on charges widely seen as politicall motivated. Russia continues to seek his extradition.
He accused Sweden of bowing to pressure from Moscow by refusing him safe passage as he lobbies European governments to sanction officials involved in the prison death of his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, four years ago.
“This is a Russian appeasement strategy,” Browder told BuzzFeed. “They don’t want to do anything that will upset Russia. They’ve chosen the ease of diplomacy over the right thing to do.”
In a letter to Browder’s lawyers dated September 11 and seen by BuzzFeed, Sweden’s justice ministry said that Russia had not requested it extradite Browder and that it could not legally intervene prior to a request being filed. “Neither is the Government authorized to instruct an authority on how to act on individual cases,” State Secretary Martin Valfridsson wrote. Sweden restated its refusal last Monday after Browder appealed.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
Interpol open to abuse by ‘criminal states’
When Petr Silaev, a Russian journalist, got political asylum in Finland in April 2012 after escaping a crackdown in his home country, he felt safe and began a new life.
But in August the same year, he found himself handcuffed and shoved face-down on the floor of a police car on a seven-hour trip from Granada, Spain, where he went on holiday, to a detention centre in Madrid, where he risked extradition.
“The Spanish police treated me in a mind-breaking way … They kept saying: ‘You’ll be deported.’ They kept abusing me, saying: ‘You’re a Russian terrorist’,” he told EUobserver.
When Ales Mihalevic, an opposition candidate in Belarus’ presidential elections in 2010, fled his home country, he found himself, in July 2011, detained by Polish airport police and risking a similar fate.
The link in both cases was Interpol, the international police body based in Lyon, France.
Belarus and Russia had filed requests for their capture using Interpol systems and two of Interpol’s 190 fellow member states, Spain and Poland, took action.
Mihalevic and Silaev are not freak examples.
In January last year, Eerik Kross, an Estonian politician and a former director of Estonia’s intelligence service, also became a wanted man after Interpol issued a “red notice” on Moscow’s say-so.
Kross is a known adversary of the Kremlin.
He was a leading proponent of Estonia’s Nato membership. In the 2008 Georgia-Russia war, he helped Georgia to fight off Russian cyber attacks.
But Russia used the long arm of Interpol to reach out for him on different grounds.
It filed the notice saying Kross masterminded the hijack of a Russian ship, the Arctic Sea, off the coast of Sweden in 2009, a claim which Kross calls “idiotic.” It did so on grounds that a witness in an Arctic Sea trial had mentioned his name.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
Do Snowden and Browder matter?
The United States wants Snowden back, but Ambassador McFaul insists it’s not extradition, just “returning” him. I’m still not clear on the distinction between forcibly “returning” someone they don’t want to go and extraditing them, or maybe we’re in hoods-and-shackled rendition territory. In any case, even if with no great eagerness, the Russian government instead looks likely to grant his asylum request.
Meanwhile, Moscow petitioned Interpol to put out a “Red Notice” – an international arrest warrant – on financier Bill Browder, the man who seems to have replaced not-so-dearly departed Boris Berezovsky as the Kremlin’s bête noire. The body that reviews such requests, the snappily-named Independent Commission for the Control of Interpol’s Files, decided that this was essentially a political rather than criminal case and declined the request. They had already rejected a “Blue Notice” that would have required member states to gather information on Browder and send it to the Russians.
And, of course, Moscow still regards arms dealer, convicted terrorist supplier and reputed Russian spy Viktor Bout, currently serving 25 years in a U.S. federal penitentiary, as a political prisoner and wants him back.
All of this obviously matters to the principals in question and also to diplomats, for whom this kind of dispute is meat and drink. But does it really matter in the big picture?
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
