On April 19–20, the Joint Baltic American National Committee (JBANC) held its 10th annual conference in Washington DC. The key topics of discussion included the deteriorating political and human rights situation in Russia, and the prospects for EU visa sanctions against Russian human rights abusers modeled on the US Magnitsky Act.
JBANC’s 10th annual conference brought together diplomats; government officials; political, business, and NGO leaders; journalists; and policy analysts from the European Union, the United States, Canada, Russia, and other countries. This year’s keynote speaker was William Browder, CEO of Hermitage Capital Management and former employer of Sergei Magnitsky, the Moscow attorney who was arrested, denied medical care, and died in prison after uncovering a $230 million tax fraud scheme involving Russian officials. Not one of the officials linked to the theft—or to Magnitsky’s unlawful prosecution and death—has been punished; indeed, some have received awards and promotions.
“I realized that it is impossible to achieve justice for Sergei inside of Russia,” Browder said in his remarks to an audience that included Magnitsky’s mother, widow, and youngest son. “So I decided to seek justice outside of Russia.” Over the past three years, the Hermitage CEO has been leading international efforts to get those implicated in the Magnitsky case—as well as other Russian human rights abusers—blacklisted from Western countries. In the United States, the visa ban and asset freeze were effected by the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act, a measure passed and signed into law last year. On April 12, the US government published its first public blacklist under the Magnitsky Act. Browder vowed to continue his efforts to achieve similar sanctions in the European Union, despite persistent threats to his own life and an Interpol arrest warrant issued by the Russian government.
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Moscow Court Issues Warrant for Magnitsky Boss Browder
Russia put Hermitage Capital equity fund head William Browder on an international wanted list after Moscow’s Tverskoi Court issued an arrest warrant for the UK-based businessman on Monday, the Interior Ministry said in a statement on its website.
The Moscow court upheld a request from investigators who said Browder had failed to respond to a summons from investigators.
UK citizen Browder is, however, unlikely to be arrested. Britain has repeatedly rejected extradition requests from Moscow for businessmen in the past.
Browder’s defense said it will appeal his arrest warrant, a RAPSI legal news agency correspondent reported from the courtroom.
Browder, the ex-boss of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, whose 2009 death in a Moscow jail triggered a furious diplomatic row between Moscow and Washington, was charged in absentia in March with illegally purchasing shares in Russian energy giant Gazprom.
He was charged with buying Gazprom stock at a time when foreign ownership of the world’s largest natural gas producer was restricted. The Interior Ministry said the charges were filed in absentia because no one had responded to the summons served two days before by diplomatic mail.
On Monday, the Interior Ministry said any comments from Hermitage Capital on the case of the Gazprom stock purchases would be interpreted as an attempt to pressure investigators.
“Representatives of the affiliate of Hermitage Capital are not a competent body to interpret the norms of Russian laws, and are not entitled to assess the actions of official bodies of power who are conducting an objective investigation,” the ministry said in a statement.
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Moscow steps up battle against Browder
The Anti-Terrorist Department (Department ‘T’) of the Russian Interior Ministry is trying to arrest the American-born head of Hermitage Capital, William Browder, who has conducted a successful global campaign to sanction those involved with the jailing and death of his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky.
Browder, left, a U.K. citizen, was named in an arrest warrant in absentia, Hermitage Capital said Monday.
‘Court records indicate that Lt. Colonel A.K. Gubanov of the Department “T” of the Russian Interior Ministry visited the second secretary of the British embassy in Moscow in March 2013 “searching” for Mr. Browder, who lives in London,’ Hermitage said.
The British Home Office rejected prior Russian requests for mutual legal assistance in relation to Browder, Hermitage said.
Browder is behind a global campaign to punish the Russians implicated in Magnitsky’s jailing and death.
The 39-year-old lawyer died in a Moscow prison in 2009 after uncovering a massive tax fraud. There was evidence he was tortured during his year-long detention and denied medical attention.
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Browder Placed on International Wanted List
A Moscow court revealed Wednesday that Bill Browder, head of the Hermitage Capital investment fund, has been placed on an international wanted list in connection with an investigation into the embezzlement of Gazprom shares.
But in an embarrassment to prosecutors, the court refused to issue a warrant for his arrest in absentia, saying they had failed to make a reasonable effort to notify Browder about the court proceedings.
The decision to place Browder on the wanted list, made April 8, was disclosed by the Tverskoi District Court as it started hearings into a request by prosecutors to arrest Browder in absentia.
Under Russian law, a suspect cannot be arrested in absentia unless he is first put on an international wanted list. After an arrest warrant is issued, Russian investigators pass the materials for the case over to Interpol.
But the likelihood of Browder facing actual arrest appears slim. Browder, who heads what was once the biggest foreign investment fund in Russia, is at loggerheads with the Russian government amid his successful campaign to blacklist Russian officials implicated in the death of Hermitage lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in 2009.
The U.S. announced Friday that several of those officials had been banned from entry into the U.S., and several European countries are looking to create blacklists of their own.
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Hermitage Capital chief Browder placed on international wanted list
Investigators have asked the court to issue an arrest order in absentia for Hermitage Capital Management CEO William Browder.
A court in Moscow said that Browder has also been placed on an international wanted list, RAPSI reported. According to Russian law, once a court has sanctioned an arrest, his case is sent to the Russian Interpol division.
Browder has ignored several summonses from Russian authorities.
He has been accused of illegally buying Gazprom stock when foreign ownership of the world’s largest natural gas producer was restricted.
The Interior Ministry’s Investigation Department opened a case against Browder on March 5. The British Embassy in Moscow has been duly notified.
Hermitage Capital dismissed the charges as “absurd” and “hysterical.”
Browder is also on trial in absentia alongside lawyer Sergei Magnitsky on embezzlement charges. Investigators claim that they embezzled hundreds of millions of rubles from the budget by manipulating tax returns between September and October 2007.
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Banned by Moscow, and Proud of It
Some kids dream of winning the World Series, others of going to outer space. I dreamed of being declared persona non grata by Moscow.
Stalin once bestowed that honor on George Kennan, architect of the Cold War doctrine of containment. Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin made this conservative’s dream come true.
On April 13, Russia banned 18 Americans from entering the country. The lucky few include a federal judge, prosecutors and law-enforcement agents, former Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, commanders of the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. And me—apparently for my Justice Department work in approving interrogation and detention policies after the 9/11 attacks.
According to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, the blacklist punishes “people actually responsible for the legalization of torture and indefinite detention of prisoners in Guantanamo, for arrests and unjust sentences for our countrymen.” Happily, I learned the news while at Camp Pendleton for a federal judicial conference. Sitting among thousands of U.S. Marines seemed a good place to contemplate Putin justice.
Russia does not typically scour the world to protest the latest human-rights violations. Moscow announced its travel ban in response to American sanctions on 18 Russian officials involved in the 2009 death of Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer in Moscow.
Magnitsky had discovered that Interior Ministry officials had used his client, Hermitage Capital, as a front to procure a fraudulent $230 million tax refund. Instead of prosecuting the corrupt officers, Russian police arrested the whistleblower. According to an investigation by the Public Moscow Oversight Commission, jailers tortured and beat Magnitsky and withheld critical medical treatment until he died.
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‘Magnitsky List’: Powerful, if not perfect
The State Department’s “Magnitsky list” – sanctioned last Friday by the Obama administration, officially branding 18 Russian government officials as gross humans rights violators – was rightly criticized as inadequate and weak by the congressional authors of the original law authorizing the creation of the list.
Congressional champions of the Magnitsky Act pointed out that State seems to be purposely misreading the law, minimizing the act’s original power to punish those who have committed egregious human rights violations by applying the criteria only to those criminals who might be dumb enough to maintain financial assets in the United States.
The Magnitsky law was born out of Senator Ben Cardin’s (D-Md.) frustration with Secretary Hillary Clinton’s dismissal of his recommendation that State blacklist 60 Russian government officials connected to the death of Russian whistle-blower Sergei Magnitsky. Clinton’s State Department was truculently opposed not just to the Magnitsky act, but to naming and shaming even the most obvious of those who now reside on the Magnitsky list.
Although the critics are right to condemn the list as inadequate, the unveiling of the list underscores a more important point. Under John Kerry’s leadership, the State Department is sending a strong message that the era of appeasing kleptocratic dictators is over.
This particular law is limited to Russia, but efforts are afoot to expand its reach. Now every letter Congress writes to State – previously batted back with polite but meaningless form letters – has the potential to grow into a new round of Magnitsky-style laws sanctioning corrupt officials in governments around the world. It will have the most impact when human rights activists leverage the “Magnitsky magnifying effect” to name, shame and seize the assets of autocrats previously unknown to the public. Public opinion is a powerful tool: it can and should be leveraged to fight corruption.
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Interview: Magnitsky’s Mother: ‘The List Is About People Who Must Answer For Their Actions’
The mother and widow of whistle-blowing Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky were in Washington on April 17, just days after the White House issued a blacklist of more than a dozen Russian officials implicated in Magnitsky’s prosecution and death in jail in 2009.
RFE/RL’s Richard Solash spoke to Magnitsky’s mother, Natalia, at a reception held in the family’s honor, and started by asking her how she felt now that the “Magnitsky list” had become a reality.
Natalia Magnitskaya: You know, this list is kind of a monument to Sergei. Although such a monument should probably be in our own country. Unfortunately, we can’t have it in our country yet, and I am, of course, very grateful to all those who have been involved in this, who have taken an interest in Sergei. The fact that the whole world, perhaps unexpectedly, has become concerned about it and that there exists such a list now is, as I said, a memorial to Sergei.
RFE/RL: Were you hoping that the list would target more officials or higher-ranking officials?
Magnitskaya: To be honest, I wasn’t following very much who would be included on the list. I didn’t think much about it. I think the authors of this list have expressed their opinion and I understand that it doesn’t include any high-ranking officials because that would have caused tension between our countries. In fact, I wouldn’t want our countries, or any countries, to have any tension in their relations.
RFE/RL: Do you think that the list can be effective in stimulating reform in Russia?
Magnitskaya: Well, one can only hope. I don’t know if it can stimulate reform, but many people are afraid to get on this list, so maybe something will change in their mind and they will stop doing horrible things and breaking the law, in fear of getting on this list, so I hope that there will be something positive about it.
I also want to say that I don’t think that this list is aimed at Russia. It is aimed at concrete individuals. It doesn’t say that Russia is bad. I am not saying that Russia is bad either. The list is about people who must answer for their actions.
RFE/RL: How would you characterize Russia’s response — its ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian children and its blacklist of U.S. officials?
Magnitskaya: It pains me to know that these measures are linked to Sergei’s name. It’s not clear why they had to do it now. I could understand Russia making a list in response to a U.S. list. Any government, in my opinion, has the right not to allow people whom it doesn’t like to enter its country. As individuals we can also be friendly with some people but not friendly with others and we don’t want to let them in our house. It is our right. Am I right?
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Browder Placed on International Wanted List
A Moscow court revealed Wednesday that Bill Browder, head of the Hermitage Capital investment fund, has been placed on an international wanted list in connection with an investigation into the embezzlement of Gazprom shares.
But in an embarrassment to prosecutors, the court refused to issue a warrant for his arrest in absentia, saying they had failed to make a reasonable effort to notify Browder about the court proceedings.
The decision to place Browder on the wanted list, made April 8, was disclosed by the Tverskoi District Court as it started hearings into a request by prosecutors to arrest Browder in absentia.
Under Russian law, a suspect cannot be arrested in absentia unless he is first put on an international wanted list. After an arrest warrant is issued, Russian investigators pass the materials for the case over to Interpol.
But the likelihood of Browder facing actual arrest appears slim. Browder, who heads what was once the biggest foreign investment fund in Russia, is at loggerheads with the Russian government amid his successful campaign to blacklist Russian officials implicated in the death of Hermitage lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in 2009.
The U.S. announced Friday that several of those officials had been banned from entry into the U.S., and several European countries are looking to create blacklists of their own.
“This is a pure vendetta and everyone knows it,” said Jamison Firestone, Magnitsky’s former boss and a close associate of Browder in lobbying for the blacklists.
“If it was really illegal to buy Gazprom, every Western hedge fund manager in Moscow would already be on the way to the airport,” he said Wednesday by e-mail.
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To learn more about what happened to Sergei Magnitsky please read below
- Sergei Magnitsky
- Why was Sergei Magnitsky arrested?
- Sergei Magnitsky’s torture and death in prison
- President’s investigation sabotaged and going nowhere
- The corrupt officers attempt to arrest 8 lawyers
- Past crimes committed by the same corrupt officers
- Petitions requesting a real investigation into Magnitsky's death
- Worldwide reaction, calls to punish those responsible for corruption and murder
- Complaints against Lt.Col. Kuznetsov
- Complaints against Major Karpov
- Cover up
- Press about Magnitsky
- Bloggers about Magnitsky
- Corrupt officers:
- Sign petition
- Citizen investigator
- Join Justice for Magnitsky group on Facebook
- Contact us
- Sergei Magnitsky
