RA in the Berliner Zeitung

Today Robert Amsterdam is featured in the German newspaper Berliner Zeitung. Below is our translation.

“Khodorkovsky is Illegally in Siberia”

Lawyer Raises Allegations against Officials

By Frank Herold

BERLIN. Mikhail Khodorkovsky, once the richest man in Russia, has no chance of being released from prison after serving half of his sentence. That is the assessment of Robert Amsterdam, the international lawyer for the former head of the oil company Yukos. “Khodorkovsky is being held illegally in Siberia,” Amsterdam told the Berliner Zeitung. “When I say that, I mean not only that he was convicted in a politically motivated show trial back then.” For months, the Russian Prosecutor’s Office has disregarded a court order to transfer Khodorkovsky to Moscow in order to investigate the new charges made against him.

In October, it will be four years since the Yukos affair reached its first climax with Khodorkovsky’s being stuck in Novosibirsk. With that, half of his prison term will have been served, and the oil magnate, under Russian law, would have the right to request his release. “When we talk about Russia, then we are not talking about a state under rule of law, however,” says Amsterdam. As proof, he cites the developments in the past few months.

Judge’s Order Ignored

Since February, the Prosecutor’s Office has been investigating Khodorkovsky anew. For this, he was transferred from the penal camp to the detention facility in the Siberia city of Chita. This time, he is being accused of theft and money laundering. In May, a Moscow court ordered that the investigation be carried out in Moscow, as have been the entire Yukos proceedings to date. But investigating officials are ignoring the judge’s order. “During the first show trials, there may have been recognizable directives to the judges on how proceedings were to be carried out,” recalls Amsterdam. “But for the outside [world], at least the appearance of adhering to Russian law was guaranteed. Now that is not even considered necessary.” Russia has moved on to the manipulation of courts by political leaders and the open violation of law and justice overall, Amsterdam said.

Amsterdam is convinced: “The Russian leadership is most afraid that Khodorkovsky will be politically active in the upcoming elections and could support a party.” That is also why the new proceedings were introduced, Amsterdam added. But there won’t be a election per se. “It is not even the same as the last trip to ballot box; the scenario is much more strongly controlled by the powers that be.” That has been taken care of by changes to the relevant laws. Russia, says Amsterdam, is moving closer and closer to becoming a one-party system; it is irrelevant that this party appears under several names.

Amsterdam does not expect Russian President Vladimir Putin to leave the political stage after the end of his second term. “We are seeing a new corporate state in Russia. Members of the political leadership are at the same on the supervisory boards of the most important companies,” he explains. Putin does not have to be president in order to stay in power. “He just has to take over Gazprom.”

Yukos, previously the largest private company in Russia, was broken up in December 2004 and awarded Rosneft, a state company.

Berliner Zeitung, August 17, 2007