Posts Tagged ‘andreas gross’
Council of Europe moots Magnitsky ‘smart sanctions’
A draft report for Europe’s top human rights watchdog advocates “intelligent sanctions” over the death of Russian whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky.
Magnitsky died in a Moscow prison after he was arrested while trying to expose tax fraud nearly four years ago.
The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe report accuses the Russian authorities of a cover-up.
But its author, Andreas Gross, said US-style black-listing of Russian officials was counter-productive.
Washington passed legislation known as the Magnitsky Act last year, to withhold visas and freeze financial assets of Russian officials thought to have been involved with human rights violations. The law has been applied to 18 Russian individuals by name.
Russia, which is a member of the Europe-wide body, is invited to comment on Mr Gross’s findings before the report is submitted for approval in September.
Allegations that Magnitsky was tortured in custody have been rejected by Russian investigators, while attempts to prosecute prison doctors for negligence resulted in no convictions.
One trial which did begin this year is that of the dead man himself, who is being prosecuted posthumously for tax evasion.
Soon after the US Congress passed the Magnitsky Act in December, Moscow banned Americans from adopting Russian children, and it recently pressured the Irish Republic, a Council of Europe member, to back down from endorsing the American black list.
Parliaments in several other European countries have also been considering action, following the American example.
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Europol joins hunt on EU-Russia money laundering
The EU’s joint police body, Europol, is hunting down Russian mafia money laundered in EU banks.
Its operation was revealed in a report by an investigator in the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe, Swiss MP Andreas Gross, out on Tuesday (25 June).
It says: “On 25 April 2013, a meeting took place at Europol in The Hague to exchange information and co-ordinate the investigation by anti-money-laundering experts of a number of countries concerned by transfers of funds originating in the tax reimbursement fraud denounced by Sergei Magnitsky.”
Gross notes the meeting “should … mark the beginning of a co-ordinated action by the competent authorities to follow the ‘money trail’ wherever it leads.”
He adds: “Russian authorities should be at the forefront of such an action, as it is the money of the Russian people that was stolen.”
The case concerns a fraudulent tax refund, in 2008, of $230 million organised by the so-called “Kluyev group” and the subsequent death of the man who exposed it – Russian accountant Magnitsky.
Europol declined to comment on the revelation, citing house rules on confidentiality.
But EUobserver understands the countries which took part in the April meeting are Bulgaria, Cyprus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Switzerland.
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Draft PACE Report Slams Russia Over Magnitsky Case
A draft report from the Council of Europe accuses Russia of allowing corrupt officials to “plunder” the state while “brutally silencing” their critics.
Swiss deputy Andreas Gross, rapporteur for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on the Sergei Magnitsky case, presented the report to the council’s Human Rights and Legal Affairs Committee in Strasbourg on June 25.
PACE is expected to consider the 41-page document, titled “Refusing Impunity for the Killers of Sergei Magnitsky,” for approval in September.
Magntisky died in pretrial detention in 2009 after uncovering a massive tax fraud scheme by police and government officials.
“It’s a report about a person who discovered injustice — you can even say a criminal act — because he discovered that not only property had been stolen but, within the tax authorities, $230 million was stolen from the Russian state,” Gross told a news conference in Strasbourg.
The report says PACE is “appalled that Magnitsky died in pretrial detention and none of the persons responsible for his death has yet been held to account.”
It claims “high-level” Russian state officials orchestrated a “cover-up.”
The document says Magnitsky died “because he refused to give in to the pressure that corrupt midlevel officials had put on him in order to get away with their crimes.”
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