High Jinks at Politkovskaya Trial

From The New York Times: Bid to Remove Politkovskaya Judge By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ Published: November 25, 2008 MOSCOW— Russian prosecutors requested a new judge Tuesday in an increasingly confused trial of three suspects accused in the murder of Anna Politkovskaya, a prominent investigative journalist, after the judge flip-flopped twice on whether to allow press coverage. The judge, Yevgeny Zubov, is accused of “violating procedural rules,” said Marina Gridneva, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor general’s office. She would not elaborate on the alleged violations, though she said Judge Zubov would be given the chance to decide whether to recuse himself on Wednesday. In a hearing on Tuesday, the judge once again decided to open the trial to the media, a second reversal on the issue, after 19 of the 20 jurors signed a statement saying they had made no official complaints about the presence of journalists in the courtroom, in opposition to the judge’s previous statements. Last week, Judge Zubov cited jurors’ fears about media coverage of the trial to bar journalists from the proceedings, overturning an earlier decision. The request to remove Judge Zubov adds to the confusions that have come to typify this closely watched trial, as well as the two-year investigation that preceded it. Supporters of Ms. Politkovskaya, a prominent investigative journalist and pugnacious Kremlin critic, accuse officials of botching the investigation into her killing, and have suggested tacit government complacency in her death. The three defendants are all accomplices. The police say they have yet to capture the person who shot Ms. Politkovskaya to death two years ago in a hallway of her apartment building, and investigators also say they have little information on who ordered the killing. In another twist on Tuesday, however, a defense lawyer in the case caused a stir in the Russian media when he announced that court documents indicated that an unidentified politician inside Russia had ordered the killing, contradicting authorities’ claims that a Kremlin enemy abroad was responsible. “During the investigation, the prosecutor general said that this was some great and horrible figure from abroad, but in the indictment we see that this is someone not so great and horrible, but a political figure inside the country,” Murad Musayev, the lawyer, said, according to Russian media. In a later interview, Mr. Musayev downplayed his statement, saying his remarks were meant to highlight the lack of evidence in the prosecution’s case. He denied that court documents identified any specific individual who ordered the killing. “This was the speculation of the investigator, who, for some reason, wrote this in the indictment,” he said by telephone. “About 98 percent of this case consists of guessing by the investigators.”

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So, it was just a guess that a high ranking political figure in Russia had anything to do with Politkovskaya's murder. Yeah, right.

Politkovskaya family lawyer ill, possibly poisoned

From the website for The Committee to Protect Journalists: FRANCE/RUSSIA: Politkovskaya family lawyer ill, possibly poisoned New York, October 14, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply concerned about the welfare of Russian lawyer Karinna Moskalenko, who represents the family of slain Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Moskalenko was the target of an apparent poisoning in Strasbourg, France, days before she was due to appear in a Moscow court for pretrial proceedings for three suspects charged in Politkovskaya’s October 2006 slaying, news reports said. “We are shocked by this apparent attempt to intimidate Karinna Moskalenko,” CPJ Europe and Central Asia Program Coordinator Nina Ognianova said. “We wish Moskalenko and her family a speedy recovery, and we call on French and Russian authorities to investigate the matter thoroughly.” Moskalenko was sickened by a mercury-like substance she found beneath the rugs of her car on Sunday morning, according to Sergei Sokolov, Novaya Gazeta’s deputy editor-in-chief. French police opened a criminal investigation but have not commented publicly, Agence France-Presse reported. Investigators were working to identify the substance, which the Moskalenkos found because the car’s rugs were not fitting properly, according to Russian press reports. Moskalenko had felt weak for several days, suffering nausea, coughing, swelling, and headaches, according to Russian press reports. The lawyer, who lives part-time in Strasbourg with her husband and three children because of her frequent appearances before the European Court of Human Rights, told the independent Russian radio station Ekho Moskvy, that her children suffered similar symptoms. Sokolov, who is in contact with the lawyer, said Moskalenko and her family were examined by doctors in Strasbourg today and were told they would recover. Doctors did not publicly disclose a diagnosis, but the lawyer said she believed the illnesses were tied to the substance, news reports said. Sokolov said lingering illness would preclude Moskalenko from traveling to Moscow for Wednesday’s scheduled opening of the Politkovskaya murder proceedings. A preliminary hearing in the case against Sergei Khadzhikurbanov, a former police officer with the Moscow Directorate for Combating Organized Crime, and brothers Ibragim and Dzhabrail Makhmudov is due to start on Wednesday in Moscow District Military Court, Sokolov said. He said Politkovskaya’s son, Ilya, and defense lawyer Anna Stavitskaya are expected to seek a postponement because of the Strasbourg incident. The preliminary hearing is significant. Sokolov told CPJ that the hearing would determine whether the case would be heard by a jury or a judge; if the defendants would be held in custody during the proceedings; and whether the trial would be open to the public. Novaya Gazeta and CPJ have called for the proceedings to be open. Sokolov told CPJ that the motive for the apparent poisoning is unclear. Moskalenko has been involved in a number of sensitive cases. Her clients include Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the imprisoned former chief executive of oil conglomerate Yukos; Garry Kasparov, the world chess champion turned opposition leader, dissident Aleksandr Litvinenko, who was slained in London in 2006; and the relatives of slain journalist Dmitry Kholodov, who was murdered in October 1994. Moskalenko and her team of lawyers at the Moscow-based International Protection Center have won 27 cases before the European Court of Human Rights and have more than a 100 cases pending, according to the Russian independent news Web site Gazeta. She has represented families of torture victims in Chechnya, as well as relatives of victims of the 2002 Nord-Ost theater hostage crisis in Moscow and the 2004 school hostage crisis in Beslan, according to Russian press reports. © 2008 Committee to Protect Journalists. http://www.cpj.org E-mail: info@cpj.org