 Yukos case Prisoners Political prisoners Nine years ago on 19 June 2003, the head of Yukos's internal economic security department, Aleksei Pichugin, was arrested. This event marked the beginning of the criminal prosecution against Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s oil company, and ultimately its destruction. The Yukos case became a test run, by order of the Federal Anti-Monopoly Service, after which Russia’s whole judicial system began to operate according to a special regime. Now anyone can be sentenced to decades or even life in prison for an alleged crime which took place at an unknown time, in an unknown place and under unknown circumstances - the wording used in Aleksei Pichugin's sentence. Lawyer Kseniya Kostromina of the Moscow City Bar Association and the International Protection Centre spoke to HRO.org correspondent Vera Vasilieva about the future of Aleksei Pichugin's applications to the European Court of Human Rights, how the former Yukos employee feels about the petition for a presidential pardon, and the growing civic activity in Russia, and much more. [Read more] |
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