Statement by Yuri Schmidt – December 2, 2005

The appeal against the improper legal proceedings (in violation of Article 6 of the European Convention), to be filed by Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s defence lawyers with the European Court of Human Rights, will be strengthened with allegations that his right to have free access to legal assistance has been violated.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s defence lawyers Yuri Schmidt and Karinna Moskalenko made this announcement at the Interfax press conference today
“We have recorded in our appeal all the irregularities the colony administration have committed in regard to the lawyers. We have reports of examinations and unprecedented searches of lawyers, including women, who were forced to strip down to their underwear,” Karinna Moskalenko said.

The penal colony administration has been creating serious difficulties for the lawyers in their work and these have considerably delayed the progress in the drafting of appeals to the European Court and RF Supreme Court. Specifically, Karinna Moskalenko described how the lawyers had informed the penal colony management in advance of their arrival and asked to be given the opportunity to work full-time, but this was not permitted. The time allowed for visiting the client was limited, with communication allowed only through a fine-meshed screen barrier that made it impossible to review documents.
In the words of Khodorkovsky’s other lawyer, Yuri Schmidt, “We were only allowed to have meetings one at a time and after Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s working hours. This resulted in loss of time and interfered with our work.”

An appeal to the European Court must be filed within six months of the entry of judgment into legal force, i.e., as the lawyer pointed out, no later than by March 22nd. The lawyers also highlighted the fact that Khodorkovsky’s counsel has already filed an appeal with the European Court, citing violation of Article 5 of the European Convention – illegal detention.

Moreover, Mikhail Khodorkovsky intends to appeal against the illegal actions of the Federal Penitentiary Service, which sent him to the Krasnokamensk colony.

Yuri Schmidt described the life of the disgraced oligarch in the colony. He said that Mikhail Khodorkovsky was forbidden to engage in research work. “Mikhail Borisovich would like to do research, but he is being forced to sew gloves ,” the lawyer said, “and this is the same as using a microscope to drive in nails.” Schmidt discovered that Khodorkovsky is taking someone else’s place since the colony only has 150 work stations for 1000 inmates. “A man who does not need to be paid is taking the place of someone else who needs the wages,” the lawyer said.

When talking about the problem of the remoteness and complicated arrangements needed to reach the colony in the Chita Region, the lawyer expressed an opinion that this had been done on purpose to make it more difficult for the inmate to communicate with his lawyers, his elderly parents and to remove him from the civic and political scene. Schmidt submits that his client has found himself “in a total information vacuum”. “Khodorkovsky only gets one local newspaper and does not know anything about what is happening in this country. He spent most of the time asking us about what was going on,” the lawyer said when sharing his impressions of the meetings in the colony.

He said that a unit numbering about 100 persons has only one television, and most of the inmates prefer watching movies rather than news or current analysis programs. The lawyers also complained about their client having no chance for normal socializing. “The majority of the inmates are young people, aged 18-20, many of whom are either poorly educated or downright illiterate. Mikhail Khodorkovsky is finding it impossible to discuss anything with them. At the same time, there are older people there, too, but the administration makes every effort to prevent them from communicating with Khodorkovsky,” Schmidt emphasized.

The lawyer said that the last time he recalls facing such a situation was when Academician Sakharov was sent to Gorky – there was a similar attempt to isolate him from society, and from the civic and political life of the country.