Posts Tagged ‘magnitsky act’
New Bill With Bipartisan Support Would Blacklist Group of Russian Abusers
U.S. News & World Report
27 June 2012, 16:02 GMT
For months, freezing wind blew through an overcrowded, smoky jail cell where Sergei Magnitsky was being tortured and held. Magnitsky, a Russian attorney who revealed the largest alleged tax-refund fraud in the country’s history, was held in conditions so poor, he contracted gallstones. Despite appealing for medical attention on 20 separate occasions, he was never treated.
After being relocated to multiple prisons, being poorly fed (if at all) and enduring deplorable conditions for nearly a year, Magnitsky died on Nov. 16, 2009, shortly after eight riot troopers handcuffed him to a bed and beat him with rubber batons.
William Browder, the Chief Executive Officer of Hermitage Capital Management, has recounted the horrifying tale repeatedly in senators’ and representatives’ offices across Capitol Hill in an effort to pass legislation that would blacklist all of those responsible for Magnitsky’s death.
Magnitsky worked as Browder’s lawyer at Hermitage, when he discovered $230 million in taxes the company paid were embezzled in an elaborate scheme by police, government officials, bankers and the Russian mafia. Magnitsky researched the crimes and testified against those involved and six weeks later was arrested. Browder estimates more than 60 people were involved in his death, from the guards who beat him to the ring of government officials who were responsible for his capture and imprisonment.
Read More →
Facebook
Twitter
Google Buzz
LinkedIn
del.icio.us
Google Bookmarks
Yahoo! Buzz
Tumblr
StumbleUpon
FriendFeed
NewsVine
Digg
We Must Be Doing Something Right
June 27, 2012
Russia is outraged-outraged!-that a US Senate committee had the temerity to pass the Magnitsky Act:
Moscow expressed outrage on Wednesday over a U.S. Senate panel’s approval of a bill that would penalize Russian officials for human rights abuses, and warned Washington that adoption of the sanctions would force Russia to respond in kind.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed the “Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act,” named after a Russian anti-corruption lawyer whose death in 2009 while in pre-trial detention drew widespread condemnation.
Despite broad support in Congress, the bill’s future remains uncertain, partly because the Obama administration is unenthusiastic about a measure that Russia says would be an unwarranted intrusion into its internal affairs.
“The effect on our relations will be extremely negative,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was quoted by state news agency Itar-Tass as saying.
“We are not only deeply sorry but outraged that – despite common sense and all signals Moscow has sent and keeps sending about the counterproductive nature of such steps – work on the ‘Magnitsky law’ continues.”
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
How to Get Autocrats to Bend
28 April 2012
Editorial
U.S. Representative Jim McGovern introduced an expanded Magnitsky act to Congress last week. The focus of the bill goes beyond the original legislation sponsored by Senator Ben Cardin, which targeted 60 Russian officials implicated in the 2009 death of Sergei Magnitsky in pretrial detention. McGovern’s bill contains an additional open clause that expands the same type of sanctions — visa bans and asset freezes — against Russian officials implicated in other cases involving “gross violations of human rights.”
Around the same time that U.S. lawmakers were working to tighten the screws on Russia, the European Union was seeing the results of similar economic sanctions on Belarus. Andrei Sannikov, an opposition presidential candidate in Belarus’ December 2010 election, and his campaign manager, Dmitry Bondarenko, were pardoned by President Alexander Lukashenko and released on April 15 after serving 16 months in prison. The two, along with hundreds of others, were arrested for taking part in mass protests against Lukashenko’s landslide reelection, which independent monitors say was heavily rigged.
Belarussian political analysts and Sannikov himself believe that the dominant factor behind the pardons were EU economic and political sanctions levied against the Lukashenko regime in March.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
Promoting Human Rights in Russia Through the Sergei Magnitsky Act
By Ariel Cohen, Ph.D.
April 25, 2012
Protection of basic human rights, including the right to own property, is an important issue for those who hold American values close to heart. In Russia, human and property rights violations are undermining the state and preventing investment and business development.
The poor state of the rule of law and pervasive corruption—including the failing court and law enforcement systems—are at the heart of persistent rights violations. They are challenging everyday Russians as well as Western and domestic investors. Russian top leaders, including both Presidents Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev, have bitterly complained about the state of affairs but did little to improve things.
Congress should press for trade reforms that are in the best interests of the United States while supporting the cause of human rights for all. The Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act (S. 1039), and its sister legislation introduced in the House of Representatives, is drafted in response to the death of Sergei Magnitsky in detention following his whistle-blowing on massive fraud allegedly committed by Russian officials. It provides a practical and balanced way forward and accommodates Russian membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO) while signaling long-term American commitment to the rule of law.
Human Rights and the Sergei Magnitsky Case
Sergei Magnitsky was a 37-year-old attorney who uncovered a giant corruption scheme that involved embezzlements of $230 million from the Russian Treasury by law enforcement and tax officials. After making accusations, he was arrested on fabricated tax evasion and tax fraud charges.
Magnitsky died in isolation at a Russian prison where he was denied medical care and beaten mercilessly by guards; an investigation by the Russian Presidential Council on Human Rights has confirmed as much. This has not resulted in the punishment of those involved. Those that were in power remain in power, and some have even been decorated or promoted. Earlier this month, Russian state prosecutors dropped charges against the chief doctor at the prison where Magnitsky died after the statute of limitations expired. The physician had been accused of negligence resulting in Magnitsky’s death.[1] Other officials implicated in the affair have been promoted instead of being punished.
Read More →
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Google Buzz
- LinkedIn
- del.icio.us
- Google Bookmarks
- Yahoo! Buzz
- Tumblr
- StumbleUpon
- FriendFeed
- NewsVine
- Digg
