President Dmitry Medvedev has rejected the recommendations of the Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights to pardon Mikhail Khodorkovksy on the grounds that a prisoner should not receive a pardon without personally requesting it reports The Moscow Times.

The council urged Medvedev to pardon Khodorkovksy along with 30 other “political prisoners” in early February, council head Mikhail Fedotov has told RIA Novosti that Medvedev disregarded his council’s advice on Monday. Fedotov said, “The President does not agree with the experts’ opinion. The President in its resolution stated that he does not understand why he should pardon someone who had not asked for clemency.”

However, Fedotov has suggested that clemency could be discussed at the council’s next meeting of the council with the president on April 28. He said, “It’s not impossible, because during the meeting of the council attended by the president, the president established a very simple rule: everyone should say what he thinks is necessary.”

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