Posts Tagged ‘the interpreter’
The Story of How the Magnitsky Act Was Born
Seldom does the death of a single person create shockwaves across the entire planet. However, when an ordinary Russian, a lowly accountant, was imprisoned and eventually died in a Russian prison, his name became a symbol for the struggle for human rights, and the reasons for a significant rift in the international community.
The Sergei Magnitsky Act, a law passed by the United states congress, sanctioned some of Russia’s business and political elite. The Russian government responded by stopping any citizens of the United States from adopting Russian children. The death of Magnitsky has stressed the world’s relations with Russia, continues to eat away at what little trust many have left for the corrupt Russian government, and has put the struggle for universal human rights back into the international spotlight.
But the story of the Magnitsky Act starts with humble beginnings, with a businessman, William Browder, setting up a meeting with a human rights advocate to speak about the plight of his tax lawyer. The story is told by Kyle Parker, the senior policy advisor for Russia at the U.S. Helsinki Commission, who spoke at Bowdoin College on Monday at an event called “From Chechnya to Pussy Riot: Human Rights and the Russian Reset.” The text below the audio is taken directly from the flyer for the event. – Ed.
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Capitalism on Trial: How is the “Navalny case” similar to those of Khodorkovsky and Magnitsky?
Obviously the government never learned any lessons from Khodorkovsky’s case, and it’s stubbornly looking for more adventures.
Act Three, Scene One: Timber Logging
Russia is getting drawn into the third landmark political trial of the decade. Khodorkovsky, Magnitsky, and now Navalny. What is common among the three trials is some historical logic, and as a consequence, they have many “overlaps”, even in appearance.
The setting for the first act of the Navalny drama is a forest. But, of course, that’s just the beginning. There will be roads – “Russian Postal Service” – and fools – “organizing public unrest”. So the fans of video production of the “political trash” type should get some popcorn, sit down, lay back and enjoy the TV show.
The Story Outline (Criminal-Political Fiction)
Navalny (the main character, a hero) arrives in the Vyatka region “to implement reforms in that particular region”. After becoming the governor’s advisor on a pro-bono basis (the governor himself pretty much stays behind the scenes) he decides to do a favor for one of his friends (who once happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time) and introduce him to the director of the local FGUP – a state enterprise that controls logging in the region (an “absolute villain”, who sells out timber and his moral principles).
The purpose of the whole scheme was apparently to put a company owned by Navalny on the very limited list of entities to which the FGUP is ready to sell timber directly, bypassing intermediaries. Those who ever have to deal with logging in Russia know that buying timber in this country is much more difficult than selling it. This is because the directors of all these logging enterprises would never sell timber to anyone but “their own”, and would never let anyone come near their forest. That’s why the forestry is decaying while those in charge are “getting fatter”. So, Navalny approached one of these “forest brothers” and “asked” him to open his “feed trough” of pines and spruces.
The director had no choice but to bite the bullet, “make some room”, and accept the company suggested by Navalny as one of his favored customers. It has to be noted, though, that the director didn’t get too generous and let Navalny’s protégé buy directly from him. 2% to 5% of his timber worth an estimated 14 million roubles. That is not surprising, since Navalny was not a local police chief, and the impression of his status of a “volunteer” advisor amounted to exactly the 2-5% that he received. If Navalny was a volunteer advisor for the local office of the FSB (formerly the KGB), he could well be entitled to much more, up to 50% …
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Open Letter on the Case of Sergei Magnitsky
To the Chairman of the Council of Judges of the Russian Federation
Dmitry Anatolyevich Krasnov
From Natalya Nikolayevna Magnitskaya
07 June 2013
Open Letter on the Case of Sergei Magnitsky
Dear Dmitry Anatolevich,
From media reports, I have learned that on 22 April 2013, the Council of Judges of the City of Moscow issued a decree which directly affected the Constitutional rights and freedoms of my son, Sergei Leonidovich Magnitsky, who died 16 November 2009 in the Matrosskaya Tishina Prison pre-trial detention center.
This decree, titled “On the Unfounded Inclusion in the ‘Magnitsky List’ of Judges of Courts of the City of Moscow” concerns the actions of four judges of the Tverskoy District Court of Moscow: E.V. Stashina, S.V. Ukhnaleva, S.G. Podoprigorov, and A.V. Krivoruchko regarding my only son. By the decisions of these judges, the members of the investigative group of the Russian Federation Interior Ministry Investigative Committee and officers of the operational convoy were provided conditions for the unlawful criminal prosecution of my son, his detention in custody for a year, and his torture and murder in the Matrosskaya Tishina pre-trial detention center.
Given the existence of indisputable evidence of the death of my son as a result of forcible actions, law-enforcement agencies to this day have not undertaken to establish the true reasons for his death and have not exposed those persons guilty of his death.
Despite the fact that the content of the decree directly affects the interests of my son, and in connection with his death, affects my interests, representatives of the council of Judges of Moscow who prepared this document did not consider it necessary to learn my opinion and take into account the facts and evidence which I possess.
From the text of the decree of the Moscow Council of Judges, it follows that they ignored the conclusions of two independent experts’ organizations that established the violation of my son’s rights and the lack of a proper judicial review of the lawfulness of the actions of members of the investigative group who detained him as a hostage, with the purpose of concealing his testimony which had uncovered the participation of officials of the Interior Ministry and tax agencies in the embezzlement of 5.4 billion rubles from the Russian budget.
The Moscow Council of Judges, citing the study of the “personal files” of judges E.V. Stashina, S.V. Ukhnaleva, S.G. Podoprigorov and A.V. Krivoruchko did not find any grounds “to doubt in any form the lawfulness and conscientiousness of the actions” of their colleagues, despite the outrageous violations of the law in the decisions they took, based on falsified evidence by the members of the investigative group. In justifying the detention of my son in custody, the investigators, without possessing evidence, submitted tampered reports of operations officials which contained deliberate lies and falsifications. In spite of the requirements of the Code of Criminal Procedures and the violation of the functions imposed on them by the Russian Federation Constitution to exercise judicial oversight, these judges did not once submit to doubt the false testimony submitted by the biased investigation.
The representatives of the Moscow Council of Judges should have known that their colleagues, Judges E.V. Tashina, S.V. Ukhnaleva, S.G. Podoprigorov and A. V. Krivoruchko rejected 40 complaints made by my son while he was still alive. Their decisions were appealed, including with an appeal to the Russian Constitution Court and the European Court of Human Rights, however he was not able to live to see their review.
In according with Art. 4 of the Rules for the Russian Federation Council of Judges, representatives of the mass media and other persons may be invited to participate in the work of the Council.
Taking into account that the issue affecting the constitutional rights and freedoms of my son represented by me was the subject of a secret discussion by the Council of Judges of Moscow, I urge:
1. That an open discussion be conducted at a meeting of the Russian Federation Council of Judges with my participation, regarding the grounds for including the judges of the City of Moscow in the “Magnitsky List,” and also with the participation of representatives and experts of the Presidential Council on Human Rights and the Public Observatory Commission of the City of Moscow, which have directly studied the circumstances of the detention of my son in custody, and also with representatives of the mass media.
2. According to the results of this discussion, that the appropriate decree taking into account the opinions of all interested persons be passed.
Respectfully yours,
Natalya Nikolaevna Magnitskaya
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