Brussels, 13/07/2006 (Agence Europe) - Ahead of the G8 Summit which opens in Saint Petersburg on 15 July, over 100 MEPs from five political groups (mainly EPP-ED, but also from the PES, ALDE, Greens/EFA and UEN groups) have sent an open letter to President Putin calling on him to transfer Mikhail Khodorovsky, the former Chief Executive of Yukos, currently being detained in Siberia, to a prison in Moscow and to ensure that the is “swiftly given a fair trial”. The MEPs, among whom feature the leader of the EPP-ED group Hans-Gert Pöttering and the Chairs of the foreign affairs committee Elmar Brok and the EP delegation for relations with Russia Camiel Eurlings (both Christian Democrats), along with the leader of the ALDE group Graham Watson, Bronislaw Geremek (ALDE, Poland) and many MEPs from the new EU Member States, say that, for Russia, the G8 Presidency represents “an important opportunity … that should not be marred by the brutal treatment that has been afforded Mikhail Khodorovsky”. They write, “We believe that Mikhail Khodorovsky is a political prisoner of the Russian Federation. His trial represented a travesty of justice and he has suffered constant human rights abuses during his arrest, trail and imprisonment, including the fact that he is being held, contrary to Russian law, far removed from his family in a prison camp in Krasnokamensk, Siberia”. The letter points out that, last January, Mr Khodorovsky was put in solitary confinement for a week “for drinking tea in a place where it was apparently not permitted”.
In a press release, former Lithuanian Prime Minister Prime Minister Vytautas Landsbergis, one of those responsible for this initiative, says “I fear for the life of Mikhail Khodorovsky”. He goes on, “He is the political adversary of President Putin who now holds personal responsibility for the prisoner's survival. It is time for the vindictive and politically motivated treatment of Mikhail Khodorovsky to stop”.