#9
Baltimore Sun
June 14, 2001
Pardons turn rare in Putin's Russia
Critics say backing harsh terms is way to strengthen state; 'Dictatorship of law'
By Kathy Lally
Sun Foreign Staff
MOSCOW - Nearly four years ago, Yelena Kozlova stole a goat worth $20 to feed
her three small, hungry children. Today, she is still in prison, serving a
term of five years and six months, despite a plea from the Presidential
Pardons Commission to free her.
Until last fall, the Pardons Commission offered Russia's 1 million prisoners
perhaps their only hope for compassion in a legal system widely described
here as blind to circumstance and extraordinarily harsh in its punishments.
Now, that hope is dying.
In an abrupt departure from the practice of the past nine years, President
Vladimir V. Putin apparently has stopped granting the thousands of pardons
recommended every year by the commission, made up of citizen volunteers
appointed by the president.
Though Putin has made no public comments about the pardons, his critics
interpret the change as part of the president's well-known desire to
strengthen the state.
"It's Putin's idea of a strong state," says Vladimir Oivin, deputy director
of the Glasnost human rights foundation, "which he expressed some time ago
when he said he was in favor of a 'dictatorship of law."'
In August, Putin appointed Viktor P. Ivanov, an old colleague from the St.
Petersburg KGB (the old Soviet secret police), as his assistant for legal
affairs and deputy head of his administration.
Since then, Oivin says, the presidential administration has been working
against the Pardons Commission.
"They have demonstrated their disregard for public organizations, and for the
Pardons Commission, which is one of the few structures of a civil society,"
Oivin says. "They want to make the regime tougher, to strengthen the secret
services and punitive organs, including the courts.
"If there are too many pardons, it would, they believe, testify to the bad
job they are doing and the mistakes they are making, giving such unjust
sentences."
Alexander Smirnov, a presidential spokesman, explained the interruption in
pardons as a need to have the list of pardons approved by the various
ministries involved in the legal system before the president considers them.
"The idea that the president doesn't want to give pardons is hardly
possible," he said.
Since September, according to Anatoly I. Pristavkin, chairman of the Pardons
Commission, Putin has granted only one pardon - to Edmond Pope, a retired
American naval intelligence officer convicted of spying. In 1999, Pristavkin
says, Putin approved 12,800 pardons.
Pristavkin, who was appointed chairman when President Boris N. Yeltsin
established the commission, blames Ivanov and officials from the Justice and
Interior ministries for the change.
"Their aim is to keep everyone in prison," he says, "even the poorest and
most unfortunate. Ivanov thinks bureaucrats are better judges of pardons than
society."
Opponents of the commission, he says, include officials who think that the
more people in prison camps, the larger the unpaid labor force.
"Of course they need people to build their dachas for free," he says,
referring to weekend houses.
Last week, Pristavkin wrote a letter to Putin, informing the president that
the commission had recommended pardons for Yelena Kozlova and 2,564 other
prisoners last fall. On May 29, Pristavkin said, Ivanov sent the commission a
letter from the Justice Ministry, dated May 10, which declared that only 118
of those prisoners should be considered for pardons because the others,
including Kozlova, had been convicted of "grave crimes."
Kozlova (whose name, ironically, comes from the word for goat) had already
served three years and four months of her 5 1/2 -year sentence for stealing
the goat.
Others who were stricken from the list because of "grave crimes," Pristavkin
wrote, included:
P. V. Menchishin, a father of three small children who stole a gas tank worth
$10.80. He has already served three years and three months of his sentence of
four years and two months.
S. A. Mozgunova, a widow with a disabled 4-year-old son who is serving five
years for stealing a purse with $31 in it.
V. N. Ponkratov, a disabled pensioner who got five years for stealing two
electric meters worth $9.70.
V. N. Postokhailov, who is serving five years for stealing three chickens and
two turkeys worth $13.
"In the villages, the accused are not protected at all," Pristavkin says.
"They cannot hire lawyers. And our repressive court system puts many people
in prison for crimes that don't necessarily demand imprisonment."
In a country where most people still don't have the right to a jury trial,
the commission has offered a rare opportunity for societal influence on court
decisions. Russia is experimenting with jury trials, but only nine of the
country's 89 regions have them. The 17 members of the commission include a
priest, a former dissident, a surgeon, a theater director, a writer and a
lawyer.
They try to understand why a murderer might get eight years while a mother of
two is sentenced to more than four years for stealing milk from the farm
where she worked. The milk was valued at less than $2, and the woman has not
been pardoned. Any energetic policeman in Moscow can earn much more than that
in bribes every day, and such crimes are almost never prosecuted.
"Of course it's absurd to give such long terms," says Valery Borschev, a
member of the pardons commission and an adviser to parliament, "but that's
what we have in the Criminal Code."
The worst criminals usually get off, says Pristavkin, but the lesser, more
defenseless ones are relentlessly pursued as police and prosecutors attempt
to produce statistics showing they are tough on crime.
"The cruelty of the courts is always surprising," he says.
The state Duma, the lower house of parliament, is considering laws that would
take into account whether a person is a first-time offender and the nature of
the crime, Borschev says.
"As for the situation with the process of pardoning," he says, "the deputies
are well aware of it, but the majority are pro-president and they don't react
in any way."
Ivanov, he says, has been lobbying hard to put the responsibility for pardons
in the Justice Ministry.
"Of course it's connected with Putin's idea to strengthen the state,"
Borschev says. "But it's only making the authorities more and more distant
from society, which is not good for the people or for the authorities."
Pristavkin says he recently discovered, accidentally, that the Justice
Ministry - which runs the prisons - sent wardens a directive telling them to
cut down on the number of appeals for pardons. Prisoners can make an appeal
only if the warden supports them.
"We used to have up to 500 appeals a week," he says. "Last week, we had 30."
The commission, he says, has asked for a meeting with Putin but so far has
not received a reply.
"We'd like to ask him, 'Are you in favor of putting still more people in
prison?' If so, we can no nothing. We'll wave goodbye, and our families will
sigh with relief at having us home again. I'll start writing books."
Pristavkin, who is 69, was a well-known writer before he accepted the
commission assignment. He was most famous for a 1987 book, "A Golden Cloud
Slept," which told about the suffering of the Chechen people deported by
Stalin during World War II. He himself was an orphan, often cruelly treated
as a child and was once imprisoned for stealing a cucumber.
The experience made him care only more deeply about injustice.
"We have been called an island of mercy in a sea of cruelty," he says.
Not long ago, he says, a member of the Constitutional Court offered a toast
to the commission.
"I don't have time to watch television or read the newspaper," he quotes the
judge as saying. "I look out the window and ask - 'Does the Pristavkin
Commission still exist?' 'Yes,' I tell myself, 'it does.' And it means the
country is still alive and democratic."
No one knows, Pristavkin says, how long the answer will be "yes."
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#10
Excerpt
PIR Center
Center for Policy Studies in Russia
www.pircenter.org
Vladimir A. Orlov, Director
2001, June 18. Report at the Carnegie Conference
RUSSIA'S NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION POLICY UNDER
PRESIDENT PUTIN
Vladimir Putin has actually been leading Russia since August 9, 1999, when
President Yeltsin, who could hardly perform his duties by that time,
appointed him Prime Minister and successor. On December 31, 1999, Vladimir
Putin was officially declared Acting President. On March 26, 2000, he was
elected President of Russia by receiving 53% of votes. His inauguration took
place on May 7, 2000. The emergence of new president in Russia and the
December 1999 parliamentary elections signified the new stage in the
development of Russia.
At present, all major characteristics of the transition are in place. New
Russian authorities review political processes and their results and work
out proposals to adjust the strategy or to formulate completely new
approaches for the next three-seven years.
Foreign policy, as well as defense and national security policy, are not
exceptions. In 2000, three key documents were adopted in an attempt to lay
down the strategy for the period of post-transition: the National Security
Concept (January 2000), the Military Doctrine (April 2000) and the new
Foreign Policy Concept (June 2000).
The adoption of these documents is quite logical, for Russia has been
seeking its role and position in international affairs during the recent
decade. The process is quite long and not always coherent, but we may
presume that nowadays, development of the Russian foreign and security
policies is being completed. Two new concepts and the doctrine summarize the
experience of the past decade, comprise successful positions and approaches
and set forth new strategic goals .
It is noteworthy that the new documents have gained support of major
political forces in Russia. In assessing Putin's new course, one should take
into account that its implementation is facilitated by political and
economic stability, which has emerged in Russia for the first time in the
last 15 years.
New documents contain some substantial novelty concerning national
priorities, specific assessments, and tools to pursue foreign policy,
defense and geo-strategic goals. In brief, these priorities can be reduced
to realism and pragmatism whether it concerns global or regional tasks.
In the future, Russia will attempt to act, basing on its capabilities rather
than any abstract values and notions. Nowadays, Russia gives more realistic
assessment of the situation in the world, of its own objectives and
abilities. Though Moscow argues in public that it will not be satisfied with
a modest role in new world order, new principles and objectives actually
imply Russia's diminishing participation in solving many global and regional
problems. Russia tries to focus on such areas and regions that are vital for
its national interests and where Moscow may have significant influence on
the situation. Realism means retreat from the established vision of
international security and world affairs, but it provides for recognition of
such facts, as the existence of the only superpower, continued importance of
force in international relations, emergence of active non-state actors on
the global arena (international terrorist groups, transnational criminal
organizations, etc.).
Another important attribute that Russian foreign and security policy is
supposed to gain is pragmatism. At present, the foreign policy should become
"efficient assistant in solving the problems of domestic development. We
realize that our foreign policy resources are objectively limited at the
moment. Hence, they should be concentrated in the areas that are vitally
important for the Russian state. These are, above all, maintenance of
security and creation of maximum favorable conditions for progressive
economic development" .
Russia no longer intends to demonstrate its flag in distant regions, does
not strive for diplomatic presence for the sake of presence. Russia foreign
policy should be "more profitable in political and economic terms". This
also means that in the next few years the role of economic diplomacy will
grow.
Diplomats and the military follow the new strategic course and try to
improve the imbalance and to prevent domination of the only superpower.
These objectives determine mostly Russia's strategic relations with the
United States.
According to some experts, the 1999 parliamentary and the 2000 presidential
elections proved that the country began to come to consensus: to raise the
status of Russia, surer policy towards the West is required. This consensus
is based on the following principles that limit the field of foreign policy
maneuver for the President:
Russia can preserve its Great Power status only through the firmest measures
to maintain its unity and integrity;
Nuclear weapons are a key factor to preserve Russia's weight in the world
and to guarantee it against any pressure on the part of NATO;
Russia's partnership with the West in the first years of democratic reforms
weakened Russia's influence on world affairs and brought no dividends to the
state and the people;
Despite a complicated relationship with the West, Russia is not interested
in encouraging confrontation in the relations or in accepting the force
scenario;
Taking into account the national interests and the existing international
commitments, Russia should strengthen and develop the WMD nonproliferation
regime.
Hence, as we may see, WMD nonproliferation issues remain one of the links
for Russia and the West in general and for Russia and the United States in
particular....
The National Security Concept signed by Acting President Putin and developed
during his work in the Security Council has some different approaches
towards WMD nonproliferation in distinction to the strategic documents of
Yeltsin's era. The Concept maintains, "international relations are being
shaped in the conditions when some states strive to enhance their influence
on international politics by developing weapons of mass destruction". As far
as nuclear nonproliferation is concerned, "Russia and other states continue
to have objective common interests" in this area.
One of the key tasks in maintaining Russia's national security is to
strengthen the nonproliferation of WMD and delivery systems, whereas
corresponding threats make the most serious challenge to Russian security .
The 2000 Military Doctrine nuclear and missile proliferation is regarded as
one of the major factors contributing to military-political developments.
The document states that Russia "stands for universality of the regime of
nonproliferation of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems, for
enhancing efficiency of this regime, for moratorium and comprehensive test
ban."
When primary threats to military security are analyzed, the Doctrine argues,
"under the current circumstances, the threat of direct military aggression
in traditional forms against Russia or its allies has decreased, thanks to
positive changes in international environment, Russia's commitment to
peaceful foreign policy, maintenance of sufficient military might, above all
nuclear deterrence potential."
Since the threat of direct aggression, including nuclear attack, is
considered to be distant, Russia's major nuclear-related external threats
are "the activities aimed at undermining global and regional stability
through interdicting the work of Russian systems of state and military
control, systems providing for the normal functioning and combat viability
of the strategic nuclear forces, missile attack early warning, missile
defense, controlling outer space, and for the normal functioning of nuclear
munitions storage facilities, nuclear energy facilities, nuclear and
chemical industry facilities, and other potentially dangerous objects."
However, practical implementation of WMD nonproliferation policy was quite
inconsistent during the first year of Putin's presidency.
On the one hand, Russia took quite a tough position on the eve of the 2000
NPT Review Conference and at the initial stage of this forum. It seemed that
the delegation had to follow instructions from Moscow and did its best to
ensure that the term "strategic stability" be included in the final
documents. The obsession with this goal indicated Russia's commitment to its
position on the ABM/NMD issues. On the other hand, Russia helped to overcome
the stalemate at the Conference, demonstrated flexibility and agreed to some
radical disarmament demands of the New Agenda Coalition for the sake of
passing the Final Document.
On the one hand, Russia seemed to strengthen export controls and tracked
sensitive contracts that could undermine national security. On the other
hand, the President was convinced by the Minatom to supply nuclear fuel for
the Tarapur NPP (India) and this was a serious blow to Russian obligations
to the NSG.
Moreover, the President kept silent, when in December 2000 one of the
ministers argued on behalf of Russia that Moscow might withdraw from the NSG
and other international export control regimes, "if current restrictions on
cooperation in peaceful use of nuclear energy were not modified."
Such position runs counter to the Russian official policy towards the NSG.
This course have recently been clearly explained by a senior official of the
Russian Foreign Ministry, which is in charge of forming and coordinating
Russian foreign policy. "The Nuclear Suppliers Group has become an essential
mechanism of control over nuclear export. We presume that the activities of
the group, spanning a quarter of a century, have contributed to
strengthening the nuclear nonproliferation regime, which eventually met the
interests of global and regional stability."....
To sum up Russia's nonproliferation policy in 1991-2001, one has to admit
that despite some inconsistency (which still exists), Russian authorities
had no political intentions and made no practical steps to support military
nuclear programs of the states of concern. Any attempts of the lobbyist
groups and some officials to circumvent these norms have normally been
nipped in the bud.
At this time Russia experienced fear, suspicion and diffidence even of the
rumors that some nuclear instability might emerge near its borders. The
state has no sufficient information resources to ensure adequate
identification of possible new proliferation risks. Russia has not enough
financial resources or any political levers to influence the situation in
the states of concern. This is why Moscow prefers to play safe and to follow
the worst-case scenario. According to the assessments of the Russian
Security Council, there is "the trend of enlarging the memberships of
nuclear and missile clubs, i.e. there are a number of states that cannot
restrain their ambitions concerning WMD and delivery systems. The areas of
most grave concern are the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Far East. We
do our best to prevent this list from growing. [...] Globalization has made
us take these threats even more seriously. It would be not reasonable to
downplay them while the situation in the Middle East is deteriorating" .
The aforementioned foreign policy priorities do not enable Russia to
recognize explicitly some of its concerns related to military nuclear
programs of some third nations. The lack of public statements does not mean
that there are no such apprehensions.
One cannot preclude that Putin's foreign policy pragmatism would lead to
nuclear cooperation to such extent that Russia would circumvent its
international commitments or profit from vague restrictions. Nonetheless,
Moscow would pursue such policy only towards its long-term strategic
partners, rather than towards potential troublemakers. This is why Russia
would hardly agree to provide nuclear assistance to East Asia (China, North
Korea) or the Middle East (Iran, Syria, Libya), even if Moscow got such
requests. Perhaps, the only state that theoretically may count on Russia's
help is India, but Moscow still refuses to recognize India's nuclear-weapon
state status.
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