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UK Relations with Russia

Mr. Streeter, it is a pleasure to see you here. This is the first time that I have spoken under your chairmanship. I congratulate the hon. Member for Hammersmith and Fulham (Mr. Hands) on securing this debate on an important subject, and I am glad that it is taking place so soon after the recess. I also congratulate the Minister for Europe, my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), my next-door neighbour, on his recent appointment. Many of us have been engaging with Russia for a long time; some, like the hon. Member for Spelthorne (Mr. Wilshire), through membership of the Council of Europe, and others through the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Indeed, next week in Geneva some of us will be taking part in bilateral meetings with the Russian IPU delegation. Those links are important, and should not be underestimated. I start with Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian President. Had I realised that the hon. Member for Hammersmith and Fulham had Russian ancestry, I would not have spent time in the Library this morning trying to find the correct Russian pronunciations—next time I shall know who to ask. When the President, a lawyer who once spoke out against Russia's "legal nihilism", took office in 2008, I hoped that human rights and freedom of expression would be strengthened. However, although he has made statements in support of civil society and human rights non-governmental organisations and met their representatives, it would appear that the situation remains largely unchanged. Seventeen journalists have been killed in Russia since 2000. The killers were convicted in only one case. Those cases include that of Anna Politkovskaya, an internationally known journalist who was a harsh critic of the Kremlin and who exposed widespread human-rights abuses and corruption in Chechnya. She was killed a little more than three years ago, but no one has yet been found guilty of either having killed her or having ordered her killing. They include also the case of Mikhail Beketov, the editor of a newspaper in Khimki, to the north-west of Moscow, who had been reporting on local government corruption and who, last November, was beaten nearly to death and left in the freezing cold; he lost a leg and fingers to frostbite. In February, the editor of a local weekly further north-west of Moscow was found unconscious and bleeding; he had published articles critical of local politicians. In addition, human rights defenders remain at risk. This summer, on 15 July, Natalya Estemirova was kidnapped in daylight from a street in central Grozny. Hours later, her corpse, with gunshots to the head and body, was dumped by a road in the neighbouring southern republic of Ingushetia. Mrs. Estemirova had been gathering evidence for the human rights organisation Memorial about an alleged campaign of arson attacks by militiamen, backed by Chechen President Kadyrov, against his opponents. House burnings have become a frequent form of collective punishment by local authorities, with at least two dozen incidents in the past 18 months. Suspected militants and collaborators, their relatives and other perceived enemies of the regime are liable to be tortured, abducted and assassinated. Memorial and Mrs. Estemirova were a constant thorn in President Kadyrov's side. I met and spoke with Mrs. Estemirova, who was a courageous and principled woman. She knew that her life was in danger, but did not want to talk about that. Instead, she concentrated on raising awareness of what was happening in Chechnya—on stopping ongoing and serious human rights violations and on getting justice for the victims. I understand that President Medvedev has placed the investigation of her murder in the hands of the state prosecutor, who will report directly to the Kremlin. However, the Russian President has already declared that President Kadyrov was not involved. Only last week, a court in Moscow ruled that Oleg Orlov, the head of Memorial, had smeared President Kadyrov's reputation by blaming him for the death of Mrs. Estemirova. Mr. Orlov had accused the Chechen President of being guilty of Natalya Estemirova's murder. However, in court, he explained in his defence that he had meant political guilt, telling the court:""The current situation in the Chechen Republic, where horrendous crimes violating human rights go systematically unpunished, has given me every basis for believing in the unconditional political guilt of Ramzan Kadyrov in the death of Natalya Estemirova"." Witnesses, mostly colleagues of Mrs. Estemirova, also said that President Kadyrov had personally insulted and threatened her, forcing her to leave Russia for a time. Mr. Kadyrov's lawyer is reported to have said that violent separatists, backed by western secret agents, were probably responsible for Mrs. Estemirova's death. If justice is to be done in that case, all lines of inquiry must be pursued and any subsequent trials must meet international standards. I must emphasise that there is such a thing as state-sponsored violence as well. More generally in relation to all those cases, the British Government must raise them with the Russian and Chechen authorities, and stress the importance of thorough and impartial investigations to ensure that the perpetrators are held to account. Impunity is a wide problem in Russia and one that undermines reform in a number of areas. The number of cases filed in the European Court of Human Rights against Russia has climbed sharply from 8 per cent. of all cases in 2000 to nearly 30 per cent. last year, with a number of rulings highlighting torture and judicial corruption. In her examination of politically motivated abuses of court systems across Europe, the Council of Europe rapporteur, a former German Justice Minister, found that prosecutors in Russia have "almost unchecked" power to put people behind bars and that judges are""subject to an increasing level of pressure aimed at ensuring convictions in almost all cases."" In addition, she points out that the practice of telephone justice—an official calling and telling a judge how to rule—has evolved for the worse. Russian judges are now so worried about making a mistake and being disciplined or dismissed that they pick up the phone themselves to ask for instructions. A plan to give extra credit to convicts for time spent in notoriously crowded pre-trial detention facilities has been derailed because it might have resulted in the release of jailed former oil tycoon and Kremlin foe, Mr. Mikhail Khodorkovsky. The rapporteur also cited the start of a second trial against Mr. Khodorkovsky in March as one of "two emblematic cases" that cast doubt on the Russian President's professed commitment to fighting what he called in the past, "legal nihilism". I call on the UK Government to raise those concerns with their Russian counterparts and to ask the Chechen and Russian Governments to open up Chechnya to parliamentary delegations, international governmental and non-governmental organisations, academics and journalists. The all-party human rights group, which I chair, has been trying to go to Chechnya since 2002—in fact, I was in Moscow with a delegation in 2002 when we were invited to go to Chechnya. That visit has never taken place. I hope that the dates for the delegation's visit will be agreed very soon because if there is nothing to hide why not open up the area to visitors?