EU urges action over Russian lawyer’s death

Financial Times

By Catherine Belton in Moscow

Herman Van Rompuy, European Council president, has called on Dmitry Medvedev to bring to a “credible” close an investigation into the death in jail of Sergei Magnitsky, the anti-corruption lawyer, before his term as Russian president expires.

Calling the case “emblematic” for “the state of the rule of law and judiciary” in Russia, Mr Van Rompuy said in a letter, dated April 18, to the Russian president and seen by the Financial Times, that bringing the investigation to “credible and thorough conclusion before the end of your term would be of symbolic relevance and send a very important signal for the future of Russia”.

Mr Medvedev came to power pledging to crack down on corruption and to boost the independence of the courts. But critics say the lack of progress in investigating Magnitsky’s death is symbolic of the president’s inability to take his pledges beyond the level of rhetoric over his four-year term. Mr Medvedev is due on May 7 to hand over the presidency to Vladimir Putin, his mentor who as prime minister had continued to be seen as Russia’s paramount leader.

The official investigation into Magnitsky’s death is due to be completed on April 24, more than two years after he died in jail in November 2009, sparking an international outcry. His death came more than a year after he alleged that a circle of interior ministry and tax ministry officials had conspired to defraud the Russian budget through a $230m tax fraud scam.

Mr Medvedev’s own human rights council has concluded that Magnitsky was likely to have been beaten to death in pre-trial detention where he had spent a year awaiting trial on separate tax fraud charges. It also condemned the tax fraud investigation into Magnitsky as being marred by conflict of interests because it was led by the same group of interior ministry officials Magnitsky had accused of being behind the $230m tax scam.
Russia’s interior ministry has denied any of its investigators were behind Magnitsky’s death, blaming two prison doctors instead for providing poor medical care. But earlier this month it dropped its negligence case against one of the doctors, claiming the statute of limitations had expired, while also reopening its tax fraud case into Magnitsky posthumously, in a move that provoked further international outcry.

Mr Van Rompuy condemned that move as a “source of further concern”, while the European Commission’s spokesman for home affairs on Friday said the decision to reopen the case posthumously raises “serious issues” about compliance with the European Convention on Human Rights.

Outcry over the case has prompted Washington to draw up a visa blacklist of officials involved in Magnitsky’s detention, while US Congress is forwarding a bill that would impose even tougher sanctions to freeze the accounts of officials involved.

On Thursday evening, the House of Representatives forwarded a strengthened version of the bill, which garnered the backing of an expanded array of congressmen, including Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, and Sandy Levin, ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee.

The bill, which has been condemned by Russia, is due for review by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee next week.
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