Russian MPs chide EU officials for urging sanctions over Yukos verdict

RIA Novosti

Russian parliament members have criticized European Parliament representatives for proposing visa sanctions against Russian officials involved in the 30 December 2010 sentencing, in a second trial, of former Yukos oil company head Mikhail Khodorkovskiy and his business associate Platon Lebedev. Their reaction was reported by Russian media on 11 January.

No point in politicizing Yukos case

Andrey Klimov, deputy chairman of the State Duma International Affairs Committee, told RIA Novosti news agency that introducing politics in the Khodorkovskiy case would hamper justice. “They [European Parliament representatives] are attempting to intimidate our judges,” Klimov said. “The reaction to this, however, will be opposite. Politicizing this case will get in the way of the normal course of justice.”

Klimov noted that the Yukos case was not closed yet: “[The verdict passed on 30 December] was that by the court of original jurisdiction. Members of the European Parliament proceed from the story of the Khodorkovskiy lawyers and media reports which, in turn, are based on the story of people close to Khodorkovskiy. They are guided by one-sided information.”

Klimov accused the European Parliament of being discriminatory in picking on the Yukos case, saying that thousands of people in Russia were being investigated for similar crimes. “The discriminative nature of their decision is amazing,” he said. “We are talking here about the richest convict because he has the money to hire good lawyers.”

He recalled the European Parliament’s recent proposal to impose similar sanctions on the Russian officials involved in the case of Sergey Magnitskiy, an auditor with the US foundation Hermitage Capital who had died in a Moscow detention centre. “Not so long ago they attempted to have a say on Magnitskiy,” Klimov said. “In that case, too, it was about a person closely affiliated with American millionaires or even billionaires … [ellipsis as published] A couple more such discriminate slants and people will be hard pressed to trust the decisions of the European Parliament.”

Members of the European Parliament are accusing Russia of ineffective fight on economic crime, Klimov said, but “when the court pronounces Khodorkovskiy guilty they demand that he be released”. He continued: “Let’s imagine that they’ve had their way – what then? Will they be able to cancel our court’s decision?”

According to him, the Russian judiciary system does require modernization, and the legislators are taking all necessary measures to that end. In particular, Klimov mentioned a recent ban on keeping suspects in economic crime in detention centres. Other measures are also being introduced, he added, such as a procedure under which people investigating a crime do not get to decide on submitting the case to court.

“We are dealing with this. But rather than doing it for just one person, as related to an isolated case, we are doing it for everyone. And we are doing it consistently,” he said.

Individual opinion not representative of European Parliament

For his part, State Duma speaker Boris Gryzlov called on his European colleagues not to jump to conclusions with regard to the second verdict in the Yukos case. “First, in my opinion, there is no political background to the court’s decision,” Gryzlov told journalists on 11 January, as reported by Interfax news agency. “Second, not all judicial procedures are over yet, there is a procedure of appeal prescribed by law.” He said that the European Parliament should take this factor into account and “abstain from making hurried statements”.

Gryzlov said that opinion of individual European Parliament representatives on Khodorkovskiy should not be presented as a general position of that institution.

“This is not the opinion of the European Parliament, not even of its Subcommittee on Human Rights, but a position expressed by individual European Parliament members,” Gryzlov said. He added, however, that he did not rule out the possibility of the issue being raised at a session of the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights, and even of “some procedural steps” being taken.

“Clueless” statements

Leonid Slutskiy, first deputy chairman of the State Duma International Affairs Committee, described the sanctions proposal as a “clueless and unfounded statement”. He was commenting for Ekho Moskvy radio, as reported by Ekho Moskvy news agency.

“Our assessment of such steps is unambiguous,” he said. “It is wrong to react to acts of provocation, thus increasing the difference of potential between the Russian and European parliaments.”

Slutskiy went on to say that Russia’s “clear position” on Khodorkovskiy and Lebedev was expressed in the 30 December verdict. “It is not worth letting ourselves be involved in such things,” he added. hairy woman hairy girls https://zp-pdl.com/get-a-next-business-day-payday-loan.php https://www.zp-pdl.com займ срочно без отказов и проверок