GENERAL POINTS

  The report is professionally put together: its authors demonstrate a sound knowledge of human rights in Russia.

  1.  There are two general deficiencies:

1.  The report was apparently written in the autumn of 2004 and therefore does not include certain facts and events that arose thereafter.

2.  Some assessments of the human rights situation are extenuating and do not take into account how things have developed since President Putin came to power.

  Below I offer a very brief response on the individual chapters that I have read which related specifically to Russia. The details of, and grounds for, my comments can be found in the original documents annexed to my review.

CHAPTER 1:  CHALLENGES AND PROGRESS

1.10  Russia (Chechnya)

  It should be noted that there has been a steady continuation of democratic gains and achievements in the sphere of human rights throughout 2004. Moreover, this process was able to gain a foothold after the formation of the new State Duma, which is entirely controlled by the Kremlin, and the inauguration of President Putin for a second proposed term.

  It should be noted that the source of terrorism in Chechnya is not some abstract international terrorism but State terrorism, which developed during the first and second Chechen wars. Between 100,000 to 200,000—the counts vary—peaceful citizens have died owing to actions by Federal troops during the fighting. There are a certain number of representatives of international terrorist organisations in separatist units, but their influence is not decisive.

  President Putin's refusal to commence the negotiating process with the political wing of the separatists, headed by Aslan Maskhadov, is leading to an increase in the extent to which international terrorism does have an influence.

  The authorities have grossly interfered with the electoral process: under pressure from the authorities, all real candidates were forced to withdraw their candidature.

  Putin's policies are causing the war in the Caucasus to spread—civilians are regularly being kidnapped by Federal law-and-order organisations in Ingushetia and Dagestan as well as in Chechnya.

  It should be noted that, despite President Putin's great popularity, opinion surveys show that the public does not believe that Putin will achieve a settlement of the Chechen conflict. Surveys have been showing for more than two years that 60-70% of those surveyed are in favour of peace talks between the warring parties in Chechnya.

  It seems that there are really no grounds for the optimistic note in the "Looking ahead" section: "we hope that President Alkhanov and me Russian authorities will now by to advance reconciliation" etc.

CHAPTER 7:  HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE RULE OF LAW

  It should be emphasised that it is not only the local administrations that exert pressure on the judicial authorities: the Federal authorities do so also. Pressure from the General Prosecutor's Office and the Federal Security Service (FSB) plays a particularly negative part in this.

  According to the "Concerted Action" Round Table of Russian Human Rights Organisations (which includes all of the main human rights groups), political prisoners and political prosecutions[12] are now prevalent in Russia. The first list (not exhaustive) contains: the academic Igor Sutyagin (for so-called "espionage"), the academic Valentin Danilov (also for "espionage"), lawyer Mlkhail Trepashkin and businessmen Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev.

  Court proceedings in each of these cases have taken place under considerable pressure from the Federal authorities and with gross infringements of the law.

  Currently underway is the trial of the director of the Andrei Sakharov museum-centre for organising the "Beware—Religion" art exhibition. The case was brought under pressure from the radical Orthodox movement and is overtly ideological. Samodurov, his colleague and a [female] artist face up to five years in prison.

  Juries are being unlawfully manipulated. It was indeed through manipulation that Sutyagin's 15-year and Danilov's 14-year sentences were achieved.

  The Russian Prosecutor's Office increasingly plays the role of the State's "sword of retribution", ie the part that it played in the Soviet era. The rout of YUKOS is a characteristic example. During the proceedings against Khodorkovsky and Lebedev, lawyers were regularly and unlawfully searched and pressure was brought to bear on YUKOS employees. This led to scores of YUKOS employees emigrating with their families, leaving Khodorkovsky and Lebedev without witnesses for the defence.

7.2  Penal reform

  This year saw collective protests in scores of penal institutions against regressive actions by [prison] administrations. The hundreds of letters received by human rights organisations describe administrations carrying out beatings and degradation [of prisoners] en masse. The many complaints that inmates and human rights advocates have made to agencies of the Prosecutor's Office have not managed to have any effect whatsoever upon the situation. The Prosecutor's Office gives a "carbon copy" response in such cases: "the facts that you have reported have not been corroborated". The Public Board set up under the Ministry of Justice is not in a position to affect the situation.

  General Kalinin expressed the strategy adopted for dealing with human rights advocates in an interview with the Nezavisimaya gazeta newspaper dated 3 August 2004, [entitled] "You guys are not with it". The Ministry of Justice is not going to let human rights advocates encroach upon its role. The very title quite eloquently indicates the content of the article. In the interview, General Kalinin in effect refuses to work with human rights advocates. Moreover, at a briefing on 7 May 2004, another General—General Krayev, the deputy chief of the Main Penal Enforcement Department—accused human rights advocates of collaborating with organised criminal gangs to orchestrate protests in prisons.

  We believe that the optimistic finding in point 7.2 that ["] the first six months of the Board's work appears to have been highly productive etc is devoid of practical evidence. More specific material on this topic can be found in the attached report—"The Russian Abu Ghraib".

8.1  Election monitoring

  It is certainly the case that the Kremlin controlled the main television channels during the parliamentary and presidential elections and only gave the pro-government party "United Russia" [access to them].

  Further election commissions were everywhere put together and controlled by local administrations and used as what was termed "an administrative resource", in breach of the law.