Canada’s House of Commons Passes Motion to Impose Visa Sanctions and Asset Freezes against the killers of Sergei Magnitsky

March 29, 2015

Canada’s House of Com­mons Pass­es Motion to Impose Visa Sanc­tions and Asset Freezes against the killers of Sergei Magnitsky

26March 2015 — The Cana­di­an House of Com­mons has unan­i­mous­ly passe­da motion call­ing for the impo­si­tion of tar­get­ed visa sanc­tions and asset freezes against those respon­si­ble for Sergei Magnitsky’s tor­ture, death, and the sub­se­quent cover-up.

The motion intro­duced by Hon. Irwin Cotler MP, Lib­er­al par­ty spokesman on Inter­na­tion­al Jus­tice and one of 21 par­lia­men­tar­i­ans from 13 coun­tries who form the Jus­tice for Sergei Mag­nit­sky Inter-Par­lia­men­tary Group, calls on the Cana­di­an gov­ern­ment to:

“Explore and encour­age sanc­tions against any for­eign nation­als who were respon­si­ble for the deten­tion, tor­ture or death of Sergei Mag­nit­sky, or who have been involved in cov­er­ing up the crimes he exposed.”  (http://irwincotler.liberal.ca/blog/motion-sanctions-human-rights-violators-magnitsky-case/)

“The unan­i­mous sup­port of this motion sends a clear sig­nal to human rights vio­la­tors in Rus­sia and around the world that they will be held to account for their crimes,” said Irwin Cotler MP. “By impos­ing sanc­tions, we can impose mean­ing­ful penal­ties on human rights vio­la­tors and deter future violations.”

The Mag­nit­sky Sanc­tions motion vot­ed on yes­ter­day in the Cana­di­an par­lia­ment also calls on the gov­ern­ment to sanc­tion human rights abusers around the world, stat­ing that tar­get­ed Mag­nit­sky sanc­tions are “appro­pri­ate against any for­eign nation­als respon­si­ble for vio­la­tions of inter­na­tion­al­ly rec­og­nized human rights in a for­eign coun­try.”

“We are pleased to see Cana­da tak­ing such a defin­i­tive stance against human rights abusers,” said Bill Brow­der. “This leg­is­la­tion will be an impor­tant step in ensur­ing that the lega­cy of Sergei Mag­nit­sky will con­tin­ue to pro­tect vic­tims of human rights abuse, both in Rus­sia and around the world.”

The Mag­nit­sky Sanc­tions motion adopt­ed in the Cana­di­an House of Com­mons fol­lows a pri­vate mem­bers bill intro­duced by Irwin Cotler in Octo­ber 2013, call­ing for sanc­tions to be imposed on those respon­si­ble for the tor­ture and death of Sergei Mag­nit­sky (https://openparliament.ca/bills/41 – 2/C‑339/).

A sim­i­lar motion has also been intro­duced in the Cana­di­an Senate.

Sev­en Cana­di­an Par­lia­men­tar­i­ans from four dif­fer­ent polit­i­cal par­ties, along with Bill Brow­der, leader of the Mag­nit­sky Jus­tice Cam­paign, pre­sent­ed their sup­port for the motion in a press con­fer­ence at the Cana­di­an Par­lia­ment yes­ter­day.  Par­lia­men­tar­i­ans in atten­dance includ­ed Irwin Cotler MP, Sen­a­tor  Raynell Andr­ey­chuk, Con­ser­v­a­tive MP and Par­lia­men­tary Sec­re­tary to the Min­is­ter of For­eign Affairs David Ander­son, Lib­er­al For­eign Affairs Crit­ic Marc Gar­neau, NDP MP Mur­ray Rankin, Con­ser­v­a­tive Sen­a­tor Lin­da Frum, and Green Par­ty leader Eliz­a­beth May.

“The Sergei Mag­nit­sky case is today rec­og­nized as a sym­bol of what can hap­pen when the prin­ci­ples of fun­da­men­tal jus­tice and rule of law are manip­u­lat­ed for per­son­al gain,” said Sen­a­tor Andr­ey­chuk, who intro­duced the motion in the Sen­ate. “I hope that the Sen­ate will soon join with the House of Com­mons and par­lia­ments around the world to express our com­mit­ment to account­abil­i­ty for for­eign nation­als who com­mit the most seri­ous vio­la­tions of human rights.”

“The tragedy of Sergei Magnitsky’s death in Russ­ian cus­tody and appalling posthu­mous show tri­al are stark sym­bols of the pre­cip­i­tous decline of Russ­ian democ­ra­cy,” added Green Par­ty leader Eliz­a­beth May. “Bill Browder’s inex­haustible efforts to com­mem­o­rate the life of his lawyer and friend are laud­able and instruc­tive. I urge the Gov­ern­ment to give full sup­port to Mr. Cotler’s call for sanc­tions that will hold the per­pe­tra­tors of Sergei Magnitsky’s tor­ture account­able. Today’s motion is an impor­tant step in the inter­na­tion­al effort to achieve jus­tice for Mag­nit­sky and help to guar­an­tee the human rights of all Russ­ian cit­i­zens.”

Sergei Mag­nit­sky was killed in Russ­ian pre-tri­al deten­tion in 2009 after uncov­er­ing a $230 mil­lion cor­rup­tion scheme and tes­ti­fy­ing against the gov­ern­ment offi­cials involved.

Fol­low­ing his death, the US passed the 2012 Sergei Mag­nit­sky Rule of Law Account­abil­i­ty Act, which impos­es visa bans and asset freezes against those involved in Sergei’s case.  34 indi­vid­u­als are cur­rent­ly banned from the US under the Act.  (http://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/OFAC-Enforcement/pages/20130412.aspx; http://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/ofac-enforcement/pages/20140520.aspx; http://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/OFAC-Enforcement/Pages/20141229.aspx).

The Euro­pean Par­lia­ment passed a sim­i­lar res­o­lu­tion in 2014, call­ing for 32 indi­vid­u­als to be sanc­tioned.  (http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?type=TA&language=EN&reference=P7-TA-2014 – 0258).  Motions and res­o­lu­tions call­ing for sanc­tions have also been passed by the OSCE, PACE, the UK, Hol­land, Swe­den, Italy and Poland.

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact:

Mag­nit­sky Jus­tice Campaign

+44 2074401777

e‑mail: info@lawandorderinrussia.org

web­site: www.lawandorderinrussia.org

Face­book: http://on.fb.me/hvIuVI

Twit­ter: @KatieFisher__

Irwin Cotler MP’s press release con­cern­ing the Mag­nit­sky Sanc­tions motion: http://irwincotler.liberal.ca/blog/house-commons-unanimously-approves-motion-calling-magnitsky-sanctions-human-rights-violators/

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