Jailed Russian billionaire on hunger strike

Tom Parfitt in Moscow
Wednesday August 24, 2005
The Guardian


Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the jailed Russian billionaire, announced last night that he was going on hunger strike in protest at his business associate being moved into an isolation cell.
The tycoon launched his protest - in which he has vowed to deny himself water as well as food - with an attack on President Vladimir Putin.

Khodorkovsky said the recent decision to move him to a cell shared with 10 others and to put Platon Lebedev in an isolation cell was punishment for his outspoken attacks on the president.

"Let the Kremlin believe that by doing this it is demonstrating power when in fact it is a demonstration of their weakness and fear," he announced through his lawyers.
"It is obvious they threw my friend into the isolation cell to take revenge against me for [critical] articles and interviews," his statement said.

Khodorkovsky, 42, had confirmed that he would stand in a byelection to the state duma lower house of parliament in December. He could be allowed to run because his appeal is pending.

The former head of Yukos oil was convicted of fraud and tax evasion and jailed for nine years in May but has maintained his innocence, insisting he was prosecuted because he supported the opposition. Lebedev also got nine years.

In his statement last night, read on the NTV channel, Khodorkovsky accused the Kremlin of settling scores: "Being unable to enter into an open political discussion with me they are using their last weapon - an isolation cell and a common cell."

Lebedev, a close associate from Khodorkovsky's business empire, was moved into an isolation cell last week, allegedly because he had refused to take walks in the Matrosskaya Tishina detention centre where the two men are being held in northern Moscow.

Khodorkovsky said his "comrade", who is reportedly suffering from hepatitis, was seriously ill and the hunger strike was an act of solidarity with him. "He knows that he is not alone," the statement said. "And each of my countrymen in whom the heart of fairness and freedom beats should know: we are together."

Yelena Liptser, a lawyer for Lebedev, told Interfax: "We believe [he] did not commit any violation and his transfer is unlawful."

Russian prison service officials last night denied the treatment of Lebedev was politically inspired.

A spokesman said Lebedev was moved because he "broke the rules of confinement and was rude to the prison administration."

He was expected to spend seven days in the isolation cell.

Earlier yesterday Khodorkovsky's lawyers had confirmed he would run as an MP in the Moscow district where President Putin is registered as a voter.

A byelection is expected there in December because the sitting MP is retiring and moving into business.

The University district is known for its liberal tendency, and veteran opposition politicians said they would support the oligarch's candidacy.

"I am prepared to support his nomination because he announced his political programme, which I share," said Irina Khakamada, who stood against Mr Putin in the 2004 presidential election.

If elected, he would still be obliged to finish serving his current sentence despite acquiring the parliamentary immunity passed to Duma deputies, the central election commission confirmed yesterday.

Since being jailed, Khodorkovsky has kept up a stream of criticism of the Kremlin via articles written in newspapers and statements to the broadcast media.

In a recent interview he repeated his claim that prosecutors and the judge in his trial were placed under intolerable political pressure.

He expressed confidence that his conviction would eventually be overturned.

(The Guardian, 8.24.2005)