PETROPAVLOVSK-KAMCHATSKIY (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 26th September, 2021) KAMCHATSKIY, Russia, September 26 (Sputnik) - Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Sunday that possible legislative action against activities of exiled tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and US financier William Browder, who call for sanctions against Russia, had been discussed and would depend on the new lower house's composition.
During his televised appearance on state broadcaster Rossiya 1, Peskov was asked about a response to Russian nationals asking other countries to impose sanctions against Russian businessmen, with Browder and Khodorkovsky mentioned by name. The spokesman replied that there indeed have been suggestions to designate such calls as an illegal activity.
"There have been no steps taken until now. But, on the other hand, there will be a new State Duma (lower house) very soon. Let's see what kind of attitude prevails there," Peskov said.
Browder, an international financier, was the largest foreign portfolio investor in Russia in the late 1990s and early 2000s. In 2013, Russia sentenced Browder in absentia to nine years in prison for tax evasion. The court also ruled that Sergei Magnitsky, a tax and legal consultant for Hermitage Capital Management, who died in custody in Moscow in 2009, developed and implemented a tax evasion scheme while working for the businessman. Russia put Bowder on the Interpol wanted list.
In 2015, Khodorkovsky, who previously served a prison term for economic crimes related to oil company Yukos, was charged in absentia for organizing the 1998 murder of Vladimir Petukhov, the mayor of the western Siberian town of Nefteyugansk. In February 2016, Russia sent a request to Interpol asking for Khodorkovsky to be placed on its international wanted list.
