Posts Tagged ‘radio free europe’

15
July 2013

Magnitsky Found Guilty In Posthumous Trial; Ex-Boss Also Convicted

Radio Free Europe

A Moscow court has found late whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky and his former boss guilty of tax evasion.

Magnitsky, who represented the Hermitage Capital investment fund, died in pretrial detention at age 37 after being allegedly beaten and denied medical treatment.

It is the first time Russia has put a dead man on trial, deepening concerns over human rights and the rule of law in the country.

Magnitsky was accused of tax evasion in 2008 after exposing a $230 million tax scam implicating Russian police and government officials. The case against him was organized by some of the same officials he exposed.

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25
June 2013

Draft PACE Report Slams Russia Over Magnitsky Case

Radio Free Europe

A draft report from the Council of Europe accuses Russia of allowing corrupt officials to “plunder” the state while “brutally silencing” their critics.

Swiss deputy Andreas Gross, rapporteur for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on the Sergei Magnitsky case, presented the report to the council’s Human Rights and Legal Affairs Committee in Strasbourg on June 25.

PACE is expected to consider the 41-page document, titled “Refusing Impunity for the Killers of Sergei Magnitsky,” for approval in September.

Magntisky died in pretrial detention in 2009 after uncovering a massive tax fraud scheme by police and government officials.

“It’s a report about a person who discovered injustice — you can even say a criminal act — because he discovered that not only property had been stolen but, within the tax authorities, $230 million was stolen from the Russian state,” Gross told a news conference in Strasbourg.

The report says PACE is “appalled that Magnitsky died in pretrial detention and none of the persons responsible for his death has yet been held to account.”

It claims “high-level” Russian state officials orchestrated a “cover-up.”

The document says Magnitsky died “because he refused to give in to the pressure that corrupt midlevel officials had put on him in order to get away with their crimes.”

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19
June 2013

Latvian Bank Fined For Magnitsky-Related Money Laundering

Radio Free Europe

A Latvian bank has been hit with the stiffest fine possible for involvement in money laundering connected to the case of the whistle-blowing Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky.

Latvia’s Financial and Capital Market Commission announced that it has levied a $191,000 fine on the bank for its role in laundering $230 million stolen from the Russian government.

The regulator did not name the Latvian bank.

The investigation started after Heritage Capital Management, where Magnitsky worked, filed a complaint in July 2012 naming six Latvian banks that allegedly received funds from the huge illegal tax refund Magnitsky exposed.

A police official accused by Magnitsky began an investigation against him for tax fraud.

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13
June 2013

Garry Kasparov: Out Of The Country, But Not Out Of The Picture

Radio Free Europe

Garry Kasparov may be staying away from his homeland for a while, but he has no intention of steering clear of Russian politics.

The chess grandmaster turned opposition figure does not mince his words when he speaks of what he calls the “Hitleresque essence” of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime.

“These days, judges rubber-stamp sentences,” he told RFE/RL’s Russian Service by telephone from New York. “Police commanders give the order to beat and hound people, to arrest them. Governors in the regions can do whatever they like and act like all-powerful lords in their domains.”

In one of his first interviews since announcing last week that he “will refrain from returning” to Russia “for the time being” for fear of a politically motivated prosecution, Kasparov said that he is focusing his efforts on trying to get European countries to adopt sanctions against senior Russian officials implicated in human-rights abuses – similar to the so-called Magnitsky list adopted by the United States in 2012.

The U.S. law is named after whistle-blowing Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who died in custody in 2009 after exposing a massive tax fraud that implicated Russian officials.

According to Kasparov, such sanctions are effective at capturing the attention of Russia’s ruling elite.

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07
June 2013

Interview: Browder Case Highlights Need To Prevent Abuse Of Interpol

Radio Free Europe

In late May, Interpol rejected a request from Moscow to track the movements of American investor Bill Browder, who has been actively seeking an investigation into the 2009 death while in custody of his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky. Russian authorities have accused Browder of tax evasion and attempting to illegally acquire shares in the natural gas monopoly, Gazprom.

RFE/RL correspondent Robert Coalson spoke with Alex Tinsley, a law reform officer at the London-based nongovernmental organization Fair Trials International, about the abuse of Interpol’s mechanisms for political purposes by Russia and other countries and about what needs to be done.

RFE/RL: What is the significance of Interpol’s decision in the Browder case?

Alex Tinsley: What happened in the Browder case is that Russia put out a request seeking to use Interpol’s channels to keep tabs on Mr. Browder’s movements, and Interpol swiftly refused to allow Russia to use its channels in that way. It has been portrayed as a snub to Russia, but it was very much to be expected.

This is an incredibly well-publicized case, and it is not particularly significant that they actually stopped Interpol’s channels being used to pursue Mr. Browder. What is more worrying is the fact that swift action hasn’t been taken in the same way in other cases of political opponents who have been pursued through Interpol’s channels.

RFE/RL: Before we move on to those cases, can you tell us more about what a red notice is and what are its consequences?

Tinsley: A red notice is an alert which lets law-enforcement agencies all around the world know that a particular person is sought by a particular country. It is published by Interpol at that country’s request, and what happens is that when a person who is subject to an Interpol red notice is encountered at an airport or other forms of police checks, they are very likely to be arrested, because lots of countries will automatically arrest someone who is subject to a red notice. And then they will potentially spend time in detention, often for several months at the expense of their health while the question is decided whether they can be extradited or not.

But there are also lots of other effects — there is a whole catalog of human impact that comes with a red notice. It can affect your ability to obtain credit, to keep professional licenses, open bank accounts. And people lose their jobs. People who need to travel and who need visas will find their visas being revoked and will not be able to travel. So it can really have some serious impact. It has been said that unlike a prosecution, there is no swift end to it. It just persecutes consistently over time.

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22
April 2013

Interview: Magnitsky’s Mother: ‘The List Is About People Who Must Answer For Their Actions’

Radio Free Europe

The mother and widow of whistle-blowing Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky were in Washington on April 17, just days after the White House issued a blacklist of more than a dozen Russian officials implicated in Magnitsky’s prosecution and death in jail in 2009.

RFE/RL’s Richard Solash spoke to Magnitsky’s mother, Natalia, at a reception held in the family’s honor, and started by asking her how she felt now that the “Magnitsky list” had become a reality.

Natalia Magnitskaya: You know, this list is kind of a monument to Sergei. Although such a monument should probably be in our own country. Unfortunately, we can’t have it in our country yet, and I am, of course, very grateful to all those who have been involved in this, who have taken an interest in Sergei. The fact that the whole world, perhaps unexpectedly, has become concerned about it and that there exists such a list now is, as I said, a memorial to Sergei.

RFE/RL: Were you hoping that the list would target more officials or higher-ranking officials?

Magnitskaya: To be honest, I wasn’t following very much who would be included on the list. I didn’t think much about it. I think the authors of this list have expressed their opinion and I understand that it doesn’t include any high-ranking officials because that would have caused tension between our countries. In fact, I wouldn’t want our countries, or any countries, to have any tension in their relations.

RFE/RL: Do you think that the list can be effective in stimulating reform in Russia?

Magnitskaya: Well, one can only hope. I don’t know if it can stimulate reform, but many people are afraid to get on this list, so maybe something will change in their mind and they will stop doing horrible things and breaking the law, in fear of getting on this list, so I hope that there will be something positive about it.

I also want to say that I don’t think that this list is aimed at Russia. It is aimed at concrete individuals. It doesn’t say that Russia is bad. I am not saying that Russia is bad either. The list is about people who must answer for their actions.

RFE/RL: How would you characterize Russia’s response — its ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian children and its blacklist of U.S. officials?

Magnitskaya: It pains me to know that these measures are linked to Sergei’s name. It’s not clear why they had to do it now. I could understand Russia making a list in response to a U.S. list. Any government, in my opinion, has the right not to allow people whom it doesn’t like to enter its country. As individuals we can also be friendly with some people but not friendly with others and we don’t want to let them in our house. It is our right. Am I right?

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16
April 2013

U.S. Targets 18 Individuals On ‘Magnitsky List’

Radio Free Europe

The United States has slapped visa bans and asset freezes on 18 individuals, most of them Russian officials, whose names have been published on the “Magnitsky list.”

The move could further strain ties between Washington and Moscow, which has vowed swift retaliation.

It could also foreshadow a struggle between the White House and the members of Congress who advocate a longer list targeting higher-ranking Russian figures.

The majority of the men and women identified — 16 — are targeted for their role in the case of whistle-blowing Moscow lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. The 37-year-old Magnitsky died following nearly a year of pretrial custody after implicating Russian officials in a scheme to steal $230 million from state coffers.

His case has since become an international symbol of injustice and a marker of Russia’s troubling human-rights and rule-of-law record.

Among the mostly low- to mid-level officials sanctioned is Uzbekistan-born Oleg Silchenko. As a senior investigator in the Russian Interior Ministry, he allegedly arranged for Magnitsky’s arrest and abuse in prison in an effort to make the lawyer withdraw his allegations against ministry colleagues.

THE ‘MAGNITSKY LIST’

Lecha Bogatyryov
Aleksei Droganov
Kazbek Dukuzov
Pavel Karpov
Yelena Khimina
Dmitry Komnov
Aleksei Krivoruchko
Artyom Kuznetsov
Oleg Logunov
Andrei Pechegin
Sergei Podoprigorov
Ivan Prokopenko
Oleg Silchenko
Yelena Stashina
Olga Stepanova
Dmitry Tolchinsky
Svetlana Ukhnalyova
Natalya Vinogradova

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19
March 2013

Russian Investigation Into Magnitsky’s Death Dropped

RFE

Russia’s Investigative Committee has dropped its investigation into the death of whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky,.

The committee posted a statement on its official website on March 19 saying Magnitsky was placed legally in pretrial detention and died there from heart complications in 2009. The committee said there was no evidence of a crime.

In 2008, Magnitsky, who worked for the London-based Hermitage Capital Investments, implicated top officials from Russia’s Interior Ministry, Federal Tax Service, Federal Security Service, and other agencies in a $230 million scheme to defraud the government.

The officials Magnitsky accused of taking part in the tax-refund fraud initiated proceedings against him on tax-evasion charges, leading to his arrest.

Magnitsky’s relatives and supporters say he was beaten and medically neglected while in jail, which led to his death in a Moscow detention center a year after he was detained.

In November 2012, the Russian authorities charged Magnitsky posthumously with tax evasion. The lawyer’s trial is expected to resume on March 22. His former boss, Hermitage Capital investments CEO William Browder, remains outside Russia and was charged in absentia.

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14
March 2013

Tussle Brews In Washington Over Russia Sanctions List

Radio Free Europe

A tussle is brewing in Washington over who will be included on a U.S. list of sanctioned Russian officials to be published next month.

Officials with the State Department are reportedly advocating steps that would shorten the politically sensitive “Magnitsky list,” while members of Congress and NGOs who support a more sweeping list are vowing to push back.

A list of sanctioned officials is required by a law Congress passed in late 2012 designed to punish Russian officials implicated in the prosecution and death of Moscow lawyer and whistle-blower Sergei Magnitsky.

The 37-year-old died in jail in 2009 after he was repeatedly denied medical care and beaten. He had been arrested after implicating officials from Russian government ministries in a complex scheme to steal $230 million from state coffers. His death became an international symbol of Russia’s rule-of-law and human rights transgressions.

In addition to slapping visa bans and asset freezes on officials connected to the Magnitsky case, the law also mandates sanctions against Russian officials who have committed other perceived gross rights violations. Those sanctions could deepen the law’s impact on U.S.-Russian relations, which have sunk in the wake of its passage.

Anticipating a furious reaction from Moscow and concerned over the legislation’s potential impact on relations, the Obama administration opposed the measures.

President Barack Obama now has until April 13 to publish the list of sanctioned officials in the federal register. He has the option of keeping some names classified for “vital national security” reasons.

The White House has given no indication of who it is considering. A list endorsed by members of Congress of officials implicated in the Magnitsky case contained about 60 names.

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