• Military

• WMD Menu                           

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

Khodorkovsky, Lebedev Found Guilty In Second Trial, Await Sentencing

Last updated (GMT/UTC): 27.12.2010 14:29
By RFE/RL

A court in Moscow has found jailed oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his business partner, Platon Lebedev, guilty of stealing billions of dollars of oil from their own company in a second trial many said was a test of the country's authoritarian regime.

Khodorkovsky's sentence is expected after the judge finishes reading the full verdict, a process that may take several days. But many believe the man who was once Russia's richest financial oligarch will stay in jail at least through Russia's next presidential election in 2012.

Outside the courthouse, Khodorkovsky supporters chanted "freedom" and "shame." They say the charges against him are politically motivated.

Hundreds of people gathered outside the central Moscow court, where police arrested at least 20 people.

Inside, a reporter for RFE/RL's Russian Service said Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev, who was also found guilty, sat impassively in a glass cage as the verdict was being read. Khodorkovsky's elderly father, Boris, held his head in despair.

Khodorkovsky is already serving an eight-year sentence on charges of fraud and tax evasion following his arrest in 2003.

He's since been accused of stealing $25 billion of oil from his own company, Yukos, and laundering the proceeds, an allegation brought months before he was eligible for parole in 2007. Many believe he and Lebedev were charged as an excuse to keep them in jail, possibly until 2017.

The judge today said Khodorkovsky and Lebedev carried out a series of false deals to enable themselves to steal oil from Yukos's subsidiaries.

Appeal Planned

Khodorkovsky's lawyer, Vadim Klyuvgant, said Khodorkovsky would appeal the verdict because the decision was made under political pressure.

"If the court was free and independent to make this decision, it couldn't have been able to make any decision but an acquittal," Klyuvgant said. "What we are hearing is not a direct, but certainly an indirect, confirmation of this fact. The court wasn't free to make the decision. We will certainly appeal the verdict after it is announced in full."

Khodorkovsky's verdict was due to be read earlier this month but was postponed in a move Kremlin critics believe was meant to minimize publicity by taking place during the winter holidays.

Speaking before the verdict's first scheduled start, Maksim Dbar, spokesman for Khodorkovsky's defense team, called the accusations against their client "absurd," saying they contradicted the outcome of his first trial.

"The main thing the charges are missing is an actual crime," Dbar said. "Even after 20 months of trial, no one understands what Khodorkovsky is actually accused of."

Political expert Kirill Rogov told RFE/RL's Russian Service that today's decision represents an important development in Russian history because it shows the authorities in Russia don’t rule on a legal basis.

"The contract [between the authorities and the people] is becoming increasingly tattered," Rogov said. "It's happening slowly, but today's verdict is a signal that will play an important role in that process."

In his final statement during the trial, Khodorkovsky said the process showed the officials running Russia's "bureaucratic and law enforcement machine" are free to do whatever they want.

"There is no right of private property," he said. "No person who conflicts with the 'system' has any rights whatsoever."

Controlled From Above

Khodorkovsky's supporters say a recent statement by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin shows Russia's court system is controlled from above. Speaking during a television call-in show before the verdict, Putin said Khodorkovsky's crimes had already been "proven in court," and evoked a line from a popular Soviet-era film.

"Just like the well-known character played by Vladimir Vysotsky, I believe that 'a thief should be in jail,'" Putin said.

Khodorkovsky's lawyers accused Putin -- who most Russians believe remains Russia's supreme leader -- of openly interfering in the court proceedings.

Putin's handpicked successor, President Dmitry Medvedev -- who's frequently promised to clean up Russia's legal system -- appeared to play down charges that Khodorkovsky's verdict was decided in the Kremlin during a televised interview on December 24.

"Neither the president, nor any other official employed by the state," he said, "has the right to express his or her position on this case or any other case before the verdict is announced -- whether guilty or not guilty."

One of Medvedev's top advisers has said Khodorkovsky should be freed. But many believe that was never likely because his real crime was to have posed a political threat to Putin by funding opposition parties and using his vast influence to lobby against Putin's aim of building an oil-fueled authoritarian regime.

Andrei Semyonov, one of the protesters outside the courthouse today, echoed the views of other demonstrators.

"This isn't a court trial from the point of view of the law," he said, "but an act of personal vengeance from Vladimir Putin for insults Khodorkovsky made him in the past."

'Criminal State'

Putin has claimed to have imposed order in Russia by cracking down against the corruption that enabled Khodorkovsky and other oligarchs to plunder the country for their own benefit. But Khodorkovsky's supporters say today's decision is a barometer for what's really happening in Russia, saying he put the Kremlin at the top of a corrupt bureaucratic system.

Khodorkovsky's 77-year-old mother, Marina Khodorkovskaya, said before the verdict that a guilty decision would show the authorities are frightened of political threats "more than anything else."

"[What's happening in Russia] is terrible for people inside the country," she said, "and probably not pleasant for European countries because right next to them is an authoritarian, criminal state."

Amnesty International has called on Russian courts to overturn Khodorkovsky's conviction. Nicola Duckworth, Amnesty's director for Europe and Central Asia, said the Russian authorities' "disregard for due process" strengthened the impression that this second round of convictions was politically motivated.

Germany's human rights commissioner, Markus Loening, denounced today's verdict as an "example of arbitrary political justice."

written by Gregory Feifer, based on reporting from RFE/RL's Russian Service and news agencies

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/khordorkovsky_found_guilty_in_second_trial/2259959.html

Copyright (c) 2010. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.