The curse of the Morozov family

Apparently, there is an old curse hanging over the Morozov family. Troubles have been happening to the Morozovs for a long time. It all started with the famous noblewoman, then it was the turn of the People’s Will member Nikolai Morozov, who spent 25 years in solitary confinement in the Shlisselburg fortress. Their tragic fate was shared by the revolutionary merchant Savva Morozov, who for some reason believed the Bolsheviks. And, of course, Pavlik Morozov, who betrayed his father, according to the legend invented for the pioneers by Bolshevik propaganda.

Ilya Morozov, the former attache of the Russian mission to the UN in New York, is an incomparably small figure in comparison with his namesakes. No one betrayed him, he did not give money to the Bolsheviks and has not yet been to prison. Nevertheless, Mr. Morozov has a chance to become a “historical man” who began the next round of diplomatic car war.

Ilya Morozov was saved from possible prison by the Russian Foreign Ministry, which quickly sent the attache home to Moscow, out of harm’s way. As you know, the New York police accused the diplomat of driving his car into a construction site while drunk, where he hit a policeman.

It is quite possible that the attaché had a little drink while working at an important reception, or simply decided to relax after a hard day. Maybe Morozov didn’t drink at all, and the New York police decided to frame a young and promising diplomat in order to ruin the good relations between the USA and the Russian Federation. This version was seriously voiced to me by one of the employees of the Russian mission to the UN.

He refused to provide information about what attache Ilya Morozov was doing in New York. And this despite the fact that the Russian mission to the UN is an open organization, and its diplomats receive, albeit a small salary, but from the funds of Russian taxpayers. And the latter have the right to know where their money is spent, to the last penny.

However, the diplomatic department of any country will do its best to protect its employee, as well as try to suppress information if this very employee is suspected of committing a crime far from his homeland.

In fact, all the world's diplomats, including Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov (who served as the Russian representative to the UN for 10 years), know that the residents and authorities of Manhattan do not like them.

There are good reasons for this: using immunity, diplomats have long stopped paying attention to traffic rules in Manhattan and to paying fines for their violations, which amounted to tens of millions of dollars.

About ten years ago, New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, desperate to get this money, asked the State Department to allow authorities to seize and auction off the cars of diplomatic missions. The US State Department decided not to take these measures, explaining to Mr. Giuliani that other countries would take adequate measures against American diplomats. For example, Nigeria, whose representatives occupy the first place in the New York list of diplomats who do not pay fines. Russia holds an honorable third place in the list.

The car wars began 10 years ago in New York, when Sergei Lavrov was late for a meeting of the UN Security Council and his driver decided to hurry up the New York police officers, honking at them for convincing. I don’t think there is a single law enforcement officer in the world who would like this. Therefore, Lavrov’s car was stopped, a fine was issued, and he was late for the UN.

Less than two weeks later, the same New York police tried to detain Russian diplomat Boris Obnosov, who was suspected of driving while intoxicated. Now Mr. Obnosov is the general director of Tactical Missile Weapons Corporation OJSC.

In February 1997, Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze set a precedent by lifting diplomatic immunity from his diplomat Georgiy Makharadze. He, while drunk, killed a 16-year-old girl in Washington.

On August 18, 1997, Second Secretary of the US Embassy in Moscow Matthew Bryse (now Deputy Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Daniel Fried) hit one of the Moscow passers-by with his car.

The Russian side demanded that the diplomat’s immunity be lifted, relying on the precedent created by Shevardnadze, but the State Department chose to recall Mr. Bryza to Washington.

And less than 12 months later, the US Consul General in Vladivostok, Douglas Kent, hit a resident of the city, Alexander Kashin, with his car, forever chaining him to a wheelchair. Despite the fact that the police (as in the case of Ilya Morozov) had suspicions that Mr. Kent was drunk, they could not prove this. The US Consul General, like Attaché Morozov, protected himself with immunity from the medical examination and quickly left Vladivostok, although the Russian Foreign Ministry asked the US State Department to lift Mr. Kent’s immunity.

Vitaly Churkin, who was recently appointed head of the Russian mission to the UN in New York in January 2001, when he was the Russian Ambassador to Canada, faced a similar situation. Then, for the murder of one pedestrian and the serious injury of a second, as well as for driving while intoxicated, the Canadian government asked Russia to lift the immunity of the first secretary of the embassy, ​​Andrei Knyazev. As a result, Mr. Knyazev was sent to Moscow, put on trial and sentenced to four years in prison.

If you believe the Russian media, one of the Foreign Ministry representatives praised Ilya Morozov for not admitting to anything. Sincere confession, as you know, lightens the soul and lengthens the term. But it is premature to make a hero out of Ilya Morozov. Remember that not only the US Representative to the UN, John Bolton, but also the Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, demanded that he be deprived of diplomatic immunity. The attache, like some of his colleagues from the USA and Russia, may turn out to be an ordinary criminal with a diplomatic passport in his pocket.

It seems to me that the time has long come to give the opportunity to a jury to decide the fate of these people in some neutral country. And where they then sit or walk, I absolutely don’t care.