Khodorkovsky sends message to the Opposition Coordination Council

At the end of November, Mikhail Khodorkovsky issued a statement to the Russian Opposition Coordination Council (OCC). He reiterated his sympathy for the opposition but also expressed some concerns regarding disputes within the OCC and aspects of its direction: “I have always been, and remain, sympathetic to those goals that the organisers of the Coordination Council have set themselves”, he wrote, but added that he was “troubled” by disagreements within the OCC that had“escalated beyond the bounds of respectful discussion.”

Khodorkovsky went on to outline seven points of advice for the OCC, including the importance of public demonstrations, the need to set realistic goals and the need to keep slogans simple, brief and succinct.

“They cannot resemble the theses of a doctoral dissertation,” he added. As for Vladimir Putin, Khodorkovsky stated: “it would be hard to count me among the admirers of this politician”, and added: “to ignore the fact of his being in power would be, to put it mildly, absent-minded.”

Khodorkovsky interview in Forbes Russia

November’s Forbes Russia featured Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s comments on BP’s decision to give up its stake in the Russian joint venture TNK-BP and become a large shareholder of state-controlled Rosneft, a company whose value is chiefly comprised of assets seized illegally from Khodorkovsky’s former company, Yukos. Khodorkovsky noted that Rosneft’s chief “considers pseudo-legal force to be an altogether normal method for resolving his tasks”, which does not augur well for BP should problems arise in the future. In this light, Khodorkovsky added: “I would like to wish Mr Dudley good luck. He is going to need it.”

More broadly, commenting on BP’s decision to tie up with Rosneft given the brutal development of state capitalism in Russia, Khodorkovsky said: “If you allow for a more ‘flexible view’ of questions of corruption, the environment, human rights, and the like, then why not ‘play’?”

U.S. House of Representatives passes Magnitsky Act

This November the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill containing the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act. The bill passed with wide bipartisan support, and now heads to the Senate.

The Magnitsky Act seeks to impose asset freezes and visa bans on Russian officials involved in human rights abuses. Named after an anti-corruption lawyer who was tortured to death in Russian police custody, the proposed legislation, which also mentions Khodorkovsky and other victims of political injustice, seeks to prevent or avenge the most brutal human rights abuses that have been occurring in Russia with impunity for their perpetrators.

The New Republic published a comprehensive story on the evolution of the bill, suggesting its main proponent, Bill Browder, achieved something of a miracle, exploiting “the friction between Congress’s desire to win easy human rights points and a White House that likes to set its own foreign policy… (and) by striking a bargain: the White House wanted to help Russia enter the WTO, and to do that, the U.S. had to repeal the outdated 1974 Jackson-Vanik Amendment, which denied the Soviet Union ‘most favored nation’ trading status”. Browder and his allies then “hitched the repeal of Jackson-Vanik to the passage of the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act, banning officials implicated in Magnitsky’s death, as well as other human rights offenders, from traveling to the U.S., while also freezing their assets.”

Prosecution continues to appeal against Court ruling reducing Lebedev’s sentence

In August, a court in the northern Russian town of Velsk – where Khodorkovsky’s co-convicted business partner Platon Lebedev is imprisoned – ruled that in accordance with changes to Russian laws on sentencing, Lebedev should be freed in March 2013, reducing his 13-year sentence by over 3 years. Prosecutors appealed against the Velsk court’s ruling, and in September a higher regional court in Arkhangelsk sided with the prosecutors, reversing what was considered to be an “excessively lenient” reduction of Lebedev’s sentence and sending the case back to the lower court for review.

In November, the Velsk court reaffirmed its position that Lebedev qualifies for early release and ruled this time that he will walk free in July 2013 – however, before the expiry of a 10-day limit for doing so, prosecutors again appealed what they still consider an “excessive reduction” in Lebedev’s sentence.

The ruling on the prosecutors’ appeal against Lebedev’s early release will be heard in December, and could set a precedent for a ruling on an eventual similar application from Khodorkovsky, who was co-defendant with Lebedev in the same trials.

German Bundestag adopts resolution raising concerns over democracy and human rights in Russia

The German Bundestag adopted a resolution raising concerns over the perilous state of democracy and human rights in Russia. The resolution cited examples including the Khodorkovsky trials and the case of former Yukos executive Vasily Alexanyan, who died after being deprived medical treatment in jail. The Bundestag called upon the German government to press Moscow on such cases, and to connect forthcoming consultations with the Russian government to issues of systemic reform. The confrontational behaviour Russia has adopted against its critics since Vladimir Putin’s return to the Kremlin was cited as a particular cause of concern.