UK Prime Minister Expresses Frustration Over Lack of Progress with Investigation into Torture and Murder of Sergei Magnitsky

March 2, 2011

Press Release

For Imme­di­ate Distribution

UK Prime Min­is­ter Express­es Frus­tra­tion Over Lack of Progress with Inves­ti­ga­tion into Tor­ture and Mur­der of Sergei Magnitsky

2 March 2011 — In a move reflect­ing the increas­ing sig­nif­i­cance of the Sergei Mag­nit­sky case to UK-Rus­sia rela­tions, UK Prime Min­is­ter David Cameron has expressed his con­cern over the lack of progress with the Russ­ian inves­ti­ga­tion into the tor­ture and death in police cus­tody of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, an anti-cor­rup­tion lawyer work­ing for the UK invest­ment firm, Her­mitage Capital.

In a let­ter to William Brow­der, CEO of Her­mitage Cap­i­tal, Prime Min­is­ter Cameron wrote that he had raised his con­cerns about the Mag­nit­sky case dur­ing his meet­ings with Russ­ian For­eign Min­is­ter Sergei Lavrov dur­ing his offi­cial vis­it to Lon­don in mid-February.

Sergei Mag­nit­sky, an out­side lawyer work­ing for Her­mitage, was false­ly arrest­ed, tor­tured and killed in police cus­tody after uncov­er­ing and expos­ing a US$230 mil­lion tax fraud com­mit­ted by Russ­ian police offi­cials and tes­ti­fy­ing against those who com­mit­ted the crimes.

In the let­ter, Prime Min­is­ter Cameron stated:

“I have now been briefed about the case and am deeply con­cerned by its impli­ca­tions for the rule of law and respect for human rights in Rus­sia. It is of par­tic­u­lar con­cern that the offi­cial inves­ti­ga­tion announced by Pres­i­dent Medvedev in Novem­ber 2009 has not yet report­ed its findings.”

Prime Min­is­ter Cameron also pledged to track the Mag­nit­sky case ahead of his planned vis­it to Rus­sia lat­er this year. He wrote:

“The For­eign Sec­re­tary and I dis­cussed the Mag­nit­sky case with Russ­ian For­eign Min­is­ter Sergei Lavrov when I met him in Down­ing Street on 15 Feb­ru­ary. We will con­tin­ue to track progress on the case ahead of my planned vis­it to Rus­sia lat­er this year. The Gov­ern­men­t’s response to the case is being led by the Min­is­ter for Europe, David Liddington.”

A total of 22 British MP’s have signed an Ear­ly Day Motion call­ing on the British gov­ern­ment to impose visa sanc­tions and to freeze the assets of those Russ­ian offi­cials involved in Magnitsky’s tor­ture and death and the large-scale cor­rup­tion he uncov­ered. The MP’s rep­re­sent a wide cross-par­ty spec­trum span­ning Con­ser­v­a­tives, Lib­er­al Democ­rats, Labour, SDLP and the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Union­ist Party.

In Jan­u­ary 2011, Chris Bryant MP, the UK Shad­ow Jus­tice Min­is­ter and for­mer Min­is­ter for Europe, sub­mit­ted to the UK Home Sec­re­tary an exten­sive 1,000-page dossier with evi­dence out­lin­ing the roles played by 60 Russ­ian offi­cials involved in Mr. Magnitsky’s arrest, tor­ture and death. Mr. Bryant also called on the British Gov­ern­ment to for­mal­ly des­ig­nate these Russ­ian offi­cials as “eco­nom­ic ter­ror­ists” under the Ter­ror­ism Act for their role in harm­ing British eco­nom­ic interests.

Despite well-doc­u­ment­ed evi­dence of abuse of office and the enrich­ment of Russ­ian Inte­ri­or Min­istry offi­cials involved in the tor­ture and death of Mr. Mag­nit­sky, Russ­ian author­i­ties have, to date, refused to inves­ti­gate and bring those offi­cials to tri­al. Instead, the Russ­ian gov­ern­ment pro­mot­ed and gave state hon­ours to those same offi­cials on the one-year anniver­sary of Sergei Magnitsky’s death in custody.

In April 2010, the US Helsin­ki Com­mis­sion (US OSCE Com­mis­sion) issued an offi­cial list of 60 Russ­ian offi­cials impli­cat­ed in the unlaw­ful arrest, tor­ture and death of Sergei Mag­nit­sky and the theft of US$230 mil­lion of pub­lic funds he uncov­ered. Short­ly there­after, the US Con­gress and Cana­di­an Par­lia­ment put for­ward leg­is­la­tion impos­ing visa bans and asset freezes on those Russ­ian offi­cials. On 16 Decem­ber 2010, the Euro­pean Par­lia­ment adopt­ed, with an over­whelm­ing major­i­ty, a res­o­lu­tion call­ing upon the Euro­pean Coun­cil for “an EU entry ban for Russ­ian offi­cials involved in Magnitsky’s case” and encour­ag­ing coop­er­a­tion of EU law enforce­ment “in freez­ing bank accounts and oth­er assets of these Russ­ian offi­cials in all EU Mem­ber States.”

Her­mitage Cap­i­tal was for a decade the largest for­eign port­fo­lio investor in Rus­sia, and this case has devel­oped a high pro­file around the world. The Her­mitage case and per­se­cu­tion of its lawyers and exec­u­tives by Russ­ian author­i­ties have been for­mal­ly rec­og­nized by the Coun­cil of Europe as “emblem­at­ic of the polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed abuse of the crim­i­nal jus­tice system.”

For fur­ther infor­ma­tion please contact:

Her­mitage Capital 

+44 207 440 1777
info@lawandorderinrussia.org
http://lawandorderinrussia.org

Back­ground Information:

Sergei Mag­nit­sky (8 April 1972 — 16 Novem­ber 2009), an out­side lawyer for the Her­mitage Fund, blew the whis­tle on wide­spread Russ­ian gov­ern­ment cor­rup­tion, involv­ing offi­cials from Russ­ian law enforce­ment and secu­ri­ty ser­vices. The offi­cials he tes­ti­fied against arrest­ed and detained him, begin­ning a night­mare in which he was thrown into cus­tody with­out bail or tri­al, and sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly tor­tured for one year in an attempt to force him to retract his tes­ti­mo­ny. Despite the phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal pain Sergei Mag­nit­sky endured from his cap­tors, he refused to per­jure him­self, even as his health dete­ri­o­rat­ed. Denied med­ical care for the last four months of his deten­tion, he died in the Butyr­ka remand cen­tre at the age of 37, leav­ing a wife and two children.

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