Interpol Rejects Russia’s Politically Motivated Warrant and Rules in Favour of William Browder

May 24, 2013

Inter­pol has reject­ed Russia’s attempt to mis­use Inter­pol sys­tems against William Brow­der, the leader of the world­wide cam­paign for jus­tice for Sergei Mag­nit­sky, by delet­ing its request from the Interpol’s channels.
“The deci­sion by Inter­pol to delete the Russ­ian “all points bul­letin” for William Brow­der from the Inter­pol sys­tem is a clear sign that a deeply cor­rupt regime will not be allowed to freely per­se­cute whis­tle-blow­ers who have exposed it. We hope that one day those respon­si­ble for Sergei Magnisky’s tor­ture and mur­der will be brought to jus­tice, with help from Inter­pol,” said a Her­mitage Cap­i­tal representative.
Interpol’s Gen­er­al Sec­re­tari­at has now delet­ed the request from the Russ­ian author­i­ties seek­ing to “locate” Mr Brow­der in order to detain him on a Russ­ian arrest warrant. 

In its deci­sion, Interpol’s Gen­er­al Sec­re­tari­at has fol­lowed the rec­om­men­da­tion from Interpol’s Com­mis­sion for the Con­trol of Files, who has found the Russ­ian request to have a “pre­dom­i­nant polit­i­cal char­ac­ter.” Interpol’s Com­mis­sion for the Con­trol of Files is respon­si­ble for the obser­vance by Inter­pol and its enti­ties of Interpol’s Con­sti­tu­tion and data pro­cess­ing rules. Under Arti­cle 3 of the Interpol’s Con­sti­tu­tion, any improp­er use of Inter­pol sys­tems for polit­i­cal pur­pos­es is strict­ly prohibited.

The deci­sion by the Interpol’s Com­mis­sion for the Con­trol of Files was issued dur­ing its 86^th ses­sion held in Lyon on 23 – 24 May 2013.
On Mon­day, 27 May 2013, Mr Brow­der will con­tin­ue his cam­paign for Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions in Europe at the ‘Time for Euro­pean Mag­nit­sky Law’ event organ­ised in Berlin with­in frame­work of the Sym­po­sium on Cul­tur­al Diplo­ma­cy & Human Rights 2013 (www.bhrc.de), on the invi­ta­tion of the Insti­tute for Cul­tur­al Diplo­ma­cy and mem­ber of the Euro­pean Par­lia­ment, Kris­ti­ina Oju­land. The Mag­nit­sky cam­paign calls for visa sanc­tions and asset freezes on Russ­ian offi­cials involved in the false arrest, tor­ture and killing of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, and the $230 mil­lion cor­rup­tion he had exposed. The law impos­ing such sanc­tions has already been adopt­ed in the Unit­ed States, and 16 Russ­ian offi­cials have been sanc­tioned by the U.S. Government.

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