in order for him to be transferred to a specialist clinic.

Around 20 representatives of the Russian intellectual elite sent requests for the attention of the Prosecutor General for the former vice-president of Yukos, Vasily Aleksanyan, to be transferred to a specialist clinic for treatment.

‘The guarantee is an official document that is filled in by everyone separately. They have been sent to the chief prosecutor. If Vasily Aleksanyan disappears we will be fined more than we earn’, Alla Gerber, chairman of the Holocaust Foundation told Interfax.

According to her, guarantees were signed by approximately 20 official and cultural figures. Among them - apart from Alla Gerber – are Liya Akhedzhakova, Mikhail Kazakov, Evgenii Yasin, Inna Churikova, Boris Akunin and others.

Alla Gerber noted that Vasily Aleksanyan, who is ill with AIDS and cancer, is in need of specialist medical treatment. In her opinion it is highly unlikely that a prisoner with these illnesses would want to escape were he transferred to a civil clinic.

’We offer our guarantees for him so that he can receive appropriate treatment at a normal clinic. Where could he possibly go in his state?’ she said.

(‘Interfax’, 06.02.2008)