Freedom for Platon Lebedev, Freedom for all Russian political prisoners

July 2, 2006 marked the three year anniversary of the arrest of Platon Lebedev, the former head of Group MENATEP. Three years ago yesterday, he was taken from a medical clinic where he was undergoing treatment for a chronic illness. Lebedev was accused of fraud and tax evasion, and after the pronouncement of a brutal verdict, he was sent to the “nearest” available penal colony, which for him was located on the Yamal peninsula, inside the Polar circle.

Since the arrest of Platon Lebedev, it became clear that the Yukos case becomes a wide-scale operation aimed at redistributing political and financial power in Russia. A show trial, which may be compared to Stalin’s trials against “enemies of the people,” was initiated. The All-Russia nongovernmental movement “For Human Rights” and a number of other Russian human rights organisations declared Platon Lebedev and his colleagues in the Yukos case – Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Svetlana Bakhmina – victims of targeted and well-planned political persecution.

There are strong grounds for believing that the true goal of the long-term imprisonment of Platon Lebedev was the Kremlin’s persecution of his friend and colleague Mikhail Khodorkovsky, whom the Russian authorities viewed as a dangerous political and ideological opponent. International and Russian legal experts and human rights activists have decried the legal abuses that occurred throughout their trial. Consequently, the European Court of Human Rights recently announced that it had granted expedited status to a case filed by Lebedev due to his condition.

However, Russian prison authorities have shown a lack of understanding and sent Lebedev to serve his sentence in the severe conditions of a penal colony on Russia’s arctic Yamal peninsula. In its latest report, Amnesty International said the cases against Yukos executives highlighted serious problems in Russia’s criminal justice system relating to the independence of the judiciary, access to effective legal counsel, conditions of detention and the use of torture and ill-treatment in order to extract confessions.

Now the Kremlin is enjoying a resurgence of power. Russia, as the Third Rome, is proudly chairing the G-8 summit and the Council of Europe. Will the heads of the world’s democracies remember the fate of Platon Lebedev and others persecuted for political reasons when they discuss global issues with Putin?

Our position remains consistent: We demand freedom for Platon Lebedev and all other political prisoners in Russia.