Teaching Comparative Government and Politics

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Rule of law in Russia

Recent news from Russia suggests that rule of law is a long way off.

In Russia, an Advocate Is Killed, and an Accuser Tried

In a small courtroom in Moscow, friends of Natalya K. Estemirova crowded onto wooden benches, clasping photographs of her. It was 16 months after the murder of Ms. Estemirova, a renowned human rights advocate in the tumultuous region of Chechnya, and now the legal system was taking action.

A defendant was on trial, and his interrogators were demanding answers about special operations and assassination plots.

But the defendant was not Ms. Estemirova’s suspected killer. It was her colleague Oleg P. Orlov, chairman of Memorial, one of Russia’s foremost human rights organizations.

The authorities had charged Mr. Orlov with defamation because he had publicly pointed the finger at the man he believed was responsible for the murder: the Kremlin-installed leader of Chechnya. If convicted, Mr. Orlov could face as many as three years in prison…

Former Russian Tycoon Is Again Convicted

Seven years ago, Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, Russia’s richest man, was jailed after challenging the authority of Vladimir V. Putin, who wanted the country’s post-Soviet tycoons to stop meddling in politics. On Monday, Mr. Khodorkovsky, still behind bars, was convicted on new charges of embezzlement in a case that has been widely viewed as an indicator of whether Russia will take even modest steps toward establishing a real rule of law…

He was convicted of tax fraud in 2005, and his companies were essentially confiscated by the government. He ended up in a Siberian penal colony near the Chinese border, where he worked in a sewing shop...

In the current case, he was accused of stealing $27 billion in oil from subsidiaries of his own conglomerate over several years, through highly complex pricing schemes that prosecutors maintained were not noticed by the Yukos auditors at the time.

Mr. Khodorkovsky’s lawyers called the new charges absurd and politically motivated. Even some government officials said they had a hard time understanding exactly what Mr. Khodorkovsky had done wrong.

Russia Rejects Criticism of Former Tycoon’s Trial

The Russian government on Tuesday rejected criticism from other countries over the new conviction on Monday of Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, once Russia’s richest man…

With court proceedings continuing and Mr. Khodorkovsky’s sentence not yet known, the Russian Foreign Ministry released a statement accusing other countries of trying to interfere with a domestic judicial matter. The ministry said Mr. Khodorkovsky had been charged with serious crimes that would be punished severely anywhere.

“Judgments about the selective application of justice in Russia are groundless,” the statement said. “In Russian courts, thousands of cases are handled that involve the legal liability of entrepreneurs. We hope that everyone will mind his own business — at home and internationally.”…

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Labels: politics, rule-of-law, Russia