Justice sought over Russian lawyer’s death; Browder urges UK ban on culprits

Express on Sunday

Financier Bill Browder is determined to see justice done for his murdered Russian lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky. A year and a half after Magnitsky’s torture and death in a Russian jail, Browder’s ceaseless campaigning has prompted Washington to ban up to 60 Russian officials implicated in the crime from entering the US.

Now Browder, an American-born British citizen, wants the UK to implement a similar visa ban on the officials. He said yesterday: “It’s time for my country to do the same thing.”

Next month, he will ramp up the pressure on the Government to take action ahead of Prime Minister David Cameron’s visit to Russia.

But his mission will not stop there: he wants to stop similar tragedies happening again in Russia. “Sergei’s death is a chance to change Russia in some fundamental way,” he said.

Sergei Magnitsky is not a household name the West. But the shameful way in which he died at the age of 37 in a squalid Moscow prison has become emblematic of much that is rotten with Russia’s judicial, police and political system.

Hermitage Capital Management, the hedge fund managed by Browder, was set up in 1996 to invest in Russia’s stock market. By 2005, Hermitage had become the most successful and largest fund in Russia, up 35 times in nine years with $4.5 billion (£2.7 billion) of funds under management. One of the ways that Browder achieved such spectacular returns was by publicly exposing corruption in big state-owned ‘I am compelled to fight on, whatever it takes’ Russian companies, which led to reform.

Hermitage’s fortunes changed in 2005 when Browder was banned from Russia as a “threat to national security” after corrupt officials had had enough of his activism.

Eighteen months later, 25 officers from the Moscow police department raided Hermitage’s offices, expropriated Hermitage’s investment companies and used documents seized in the raids to apply for a fraudulent £140 million tax refund. Magnitsky testified against the police officers who had seized Hermitage’s documents and was arrested one month later. The officers he had testified against made the arrests. He was then tortured so that he would withdraw his testimony against the officers and sign a false confession.

The lawyer was put in the notorious Butyrskaya prison in Moscow. At times, he was held in a cramped cell, which often swarmed with rats, with three other inmates. He was also kept in cells with no heating. After six months in these deplorable conditions, he fell ill, losing 40 lbs in weight, and was diagnosed with gall bladder stones, and painful pancreatitis. He applied for medical attention on more than 20 occasions but all of his requests were ignored or refused.

On November 16, 2009, he died. The Russian authorities attributed his death to a rupture to the abdominal membrane, before changing their story later the same day and saying he’d had a heart attack. President Medvedev’s Human Rights Council concluded that he was beaten by eight guards with rubber batons one hour before his death. His mother says he had broken fingers and bruises on his body. The authorities have further fuelled suspicions of foul play by rejecting autopsy requests and all requests from his family for his medical file.

Magnitsky left a widow, Natalya, and two sons. Browder said: “I was so deeply distressed by Sergei’s death that I am compelled to get justice, whatever it takes.”

Calls for Russia to hold an investigation have largely fallen on deaf ears. So far, just two low-level doctors have been charged with negligence. Meanwhile, the high-level officials most intimately involved in the scandal have been promoted and fully exonerated.

So Browder has decided to take his fight for justice outside Russia. His first stop was America where he secured the support of Senator Benjamin Cardin, a democrat who wrote to Hillary Clinton.

After the State Department rejected Browder’s calls for a ban on the Russians’ visa entry, Cardin drafted The Justice for Sergei Magnitsky Act which would make it law. The legislation also demanded that the perpetrators’ assets be frozen.

Then the families of other victims of Russian miscarriages of justice, such as jailed oligarch Mikhail Khordokovsky and murdered journalist Anna Poliykovskaya, asked to be included in the Act. Browder said: “I couldn’t think of a more meaningful way of honouring Sergei’s memory, and hope it will stop the same tragedy happening to other victims.”

The law was submitted to the Senate floor for voting with “unprecedented” support.

At this point, the State Department finally sat up and listened. In July, it finally issued its own visa ban, prompting a furious response from Russia. After threatening to end co-operation with the US on Iran and North Korea, Russia settled on a tit-for-tat ban against FBI agents involved in two US cases related to arms dealing and drug smuggling. Even more ridiculously, the Russian Interior Ministry has decided to prosecute Magnitsky posthumously.

Browder also took his fight to Brussels, which passed a resolution calling for visa bans and asset freezes in all European member states.

So far, the Netherlands has come the furthest in actually implementing the resolution. And Britain? Browder said: “The British Government has been very supportive. But it’s time to stop Sergei’s murderers coming to the UK and spending their blood money here.”

Browder intends to “ask the British Government nicely” to ban the officials on the “Magnitsky List” like the US did. If those attempts fail, he is planning to mount a “more aggressive campaign through a variety of channels” demanding they implement a travel ban on the 60 officials. He said: “Now is the time for the British Government to move away from cynical Realpolitik and do the morally correct thing.”

For Browder personally, a lot is at stake: he has had 11 death threats and remains in close contact with the Scotland Yard terrorism arm.

Despite the risk to his safety, he is intent on bringing about change in Russia. He said: “These events lay bare the criminality of the Russian system. Sergei’s death has been a major turning point.”‘I am compelled to fight on, whatever it takes.’ payday loan hairy girls https://zp-pdl.com/online-payday-loans-in-america.php www.zp-pdl.com unshaven girls