Khodorkovsky’s mother replies to questions from The New Times

What is currently happening in your son’s court case?

Everything is moving along slowly.  Every day he is taken to the prosecutor’s office in Chita. There he reads the notes of his case. Nothing else is happening.

Many people say that the newly elected President Medvedev will pardon Mikhail Borisovich. What do you think, might that happen?

I can only hope.  I have no other emotions.  This is not something Misha and I can discuss there or talk about.

When did you last see each other?  What state is he in now?

I flew back to Moscow on 21 March.  I saw him on 19 March.  He is perfectly cheerful.  He is not letting it get him down.  He looks worse, naturally, because it is not long since his hunger-strike.  He is very pale, but no – he is more strong minded than any of us.

What do you think, should he petition for clemency?

That is up to him, and I am not going to try to interfere.  I won’t even ask him questions like that.  There are topics we don’t mention.  What can I personally say about it?  Nothing.  It must be his decision. You see, you can really only decide something like that if you have been in prison there for four years yourself.  Then you could decide, but there is really nothing we can say about it.

At the beginning of May the preliminary investigation in connection with the second case against him will run out of time.  What do you think, will this new case go ahead?


It is difficult to say...  For the present I can’t see any turn for the better.  If you could see even half a step, or a quarter, it would be – I’m not talking about our court case, but about things in general.  For the present everything is still just exactly as it was.

Thank you very much, Maria Filippovna.

You have to understand my situation.  We are not allowed to talk about anything there.  When he was in the labour camp I got three days with him. There you could at least more or less whisper about things, but now we’re sitting opposite each other at a table with another person sitting to one side.  So apart from family matters there’s practically nothing we are allowed to talk about.  I know all the subjects we are not allowed to talk about.  I know them very well after these years.  So I don’t raise them. What’s the point?  So they don’t allow me to visit him next time?  Some things you can tell each other with your eyes... many topics are banned.  You are welcome to talk about family matters. We talk about the grammar school he founded, yes, but not about anything else.

(Oleg Dusaev, The New Times, 7.4.2008)