Under Russian law an individual may be pardoned without admitting guilt, asserts Yury Schmidt, and without applying for a pardon.

“I contend that it is possible to pardon without an admission of guilt or expression of penitence. I also consider it possible without a personal appeal by the individual to whom the pardon applies,” declares Khodorkovsky’s defence attorney Yury Schmidt.

Schmidt offered the following clarification. Russian legislation does not lay down a precise procedure for issuing a pardon but the country’s Constitution says that the Head of State has the right to pardon. The Criminal Code envisages release from punishment as a result of a pardon “but legislative acts regulating this procedure do not exist”.

At his meeting with Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the German foreign minister, Schmidt discussed ways of releasing his client “that are possible without taking such exceptional measures as a pardon or an amnesty”. Schmidt explained: “I gave a detailed account of the possibility that the verdict could be re-examined and also of Khodorkovsky’s parole entitlement,” the deadline for the latter having been reached in October 2007.

The question of a pardon was not discussed for any length of time, Schmidt noted, during his meeting with Steinmeier. “In any civilised country, and even in countries that are not civilised, the highest official has the right to pardon,” said Schmidt.

The attorney told the Novosti news agency that he had not discussed an application for a pardon with his client. “Whether Mikhail Khodorkovsky will decide to apply for a pardon I do not know. I haven’t discussed the matter with him,” said Schmidt. He considered his client to be innocent, he stressed.

(Interfax and RIA Novosti, 05.06.2008)