Posts Tagged ‘congress’
U.S. senator proposes expansion of “Magnitsky list”
Interfax
U.S. Senator Benjamin Cardin has suggested that the names of the Russian officials who failed to take measures against the officials responsible for the death of auditor Sergei Magnitsky should be added to the so-called Magnitsky list, Hermitage Сapital has reported.
“Today Senator Benjamin Cardin has submitted to the U.S. Senate an expanded draft of the bill on Sergei Magnitsky,” Hermitage Capital said in a report obtained by Interfax on Friday.
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Russia-US stand apart over Magnitsky bill
The US senate is considering a resounding rap on the knuckles to Russia, in a bill that went before Congress on Thursday, lambasting the rule of law in Russia and condemning a raft of officials whom supporters of dead lawyer Sergei Magnitsky accuse of corruption and complicity in his death.
A bipartisan bill sponsored by 15 senators proposes to again freeze the assets and block visas of individuals who Washington sees as committing gross human rights violations against Russian human rights activists.
The Russian foreign ministry said the bill was “regrettable,” RIA Novosti reported.
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Senators propose hitting Russian ‘kleptocrats’ with sanctions after lawyer’s death
A bipartisan group of senators on Thursday introduced legislation that would sanction Russian officials involved in the 2009 death of a Russian lawyer who alleged that the government was involved in a tax fraud scheme.
The bill is a reaction to the death of Sergei Magnitsky, whose case has come to be seen as a symbol of corruption in the Russian legal system. Magnitsky was a Russian lawyer hired by an American law firm and who worked for Hermitage Capital.
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), the lead sponsor of the bill, said Magnitsky “blew the whistle on the largest known tax fraud in Russian history,” and named Russian officials involved in the plan to defraud Russia of about $230 million. Magnitsky was soon arrested, held in detention for almost a year with no trial, and died after suffering from untreated medical complications.
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Bill Browder welcomes US action over Magnitsky death
A powerful group of US politicians has called for sanctions against Russians allegedly involved in a campaign against financier Bill Browder. Once one of Russia’s largest investors, he claims officials were complicit in a fraud against his firm and the death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky.
Now Congressmen, including heavyweights Joe Lieberman and John McCain, propose banning the officials from the US.
Russia’s President Dmitry Medvedev has promised a full inquiry into the death.
The US politicians are backing new legislation put before Congress on Friday, The Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2011.
In 2005, Mr Browder, who runs fund manager Hermitage Capital, was banned from Russia as a threat to national security after allegations that his firm evaded tax. But Mr Browder says his company was targeted in a $230m (£140m) fraud, and has mounted a strong campaign to uncover what happened to the money and Mr Magnitsky, Hermitage’s lawyer.
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US Senators seek to sanction human rights violators in Russia
A bipartisan bill freezing assets and blocking visas of individuals who commit gross human-rights violations against Russian rights activists was introduced in the U.S. Senate on Thursday.
The bill is sponsored by 14 senators, including one of its principal initiators, Senator Benjamin Cardin (D-MD), co-chairman of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, an independent U.S. government agency monitoring compliance with the Helsinki Accords.
The Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2011 seeks to combat what has become “a toxic atmosphere of impunity in Russia where despite occasional rhetoric from the Kremlin, the authorities have failed to follow through with meaningful action to stem rampant corruption or bring the perpetrators of numerous and high-profile crimes to justice,” Sen. Cardin said in introducing the bill.
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U.S. Lawmakers Want Justice For Magnitsky
Last month, Rep. James McGovern, a Democrat from Massachusetts, introduced the “Justice for Sergei Magnitsky Act of 2011.” Two other Democrats and four Republican members co-sponsored the bill. It’s now pending before the House Judiciary Committee and the Committee on Financial Services.
Magnitsky was a lawyer in Moscow for William Browder’s Hermitage Capital Management, once the biggest foreign investor in Russia.
In 2005, the Russian government banned Browder from the country. Two years later, police and agents from the Ministry of the Interior raided Hermitage’s offices and those of its lawyers. They hauled away corporate documents and seals that were later used to defraud the Russian government out of a $230 million tax refund.
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Russian “Justice”
The new, Republican-majority Congress is starting its work with a jaundiced eye on what’s going on in Russia. Just a week ago Moscow convicted Mikhail Khodorkovsky for crimes most legal experts believe he did not commit. Former Deputy Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov is in jail, albeit only for two weeks, for demonstrating in support of freedom of assembly. But it is the fourteen-year sentence meted out against Khodorkovsky which is particularly telling. It reflects not guilt on the part of the ex-chairman of Russia’s Yukos oil company, but the animus against the man by Russia’s rulers. Even if American companies want to do business in Russia, the verdict and the arrests don’t help.
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Cardin-McCain whistleblower bill could be a threat to U.S.-Russian ties
The Hill
As the White House feverishly lobbies the Senate to approve a long-stalled nuclear-arms treaty, a bipartisan bill seeking answers in the suspicious death of a Russian attorney could escalate tensions between Washington and Moscow.
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) as co-sponsor, introduced the Justice for Sergei Magnitsky Act of 2010 just before lawmakers went home to campaign this fall. Rep. James McGovern (D-Mass.) has offered companion legislation in the House.
The legislation comes as the Obama administration urges senators to vote for the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) said last week should not be approved in the lame-duck session. The U.S.-Russia arms treaty needs 67 votes to be ratified.
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