Magnetic curtain

Barack Obama signed the Law of Magnitsky, and the State Duma adopted the law of Dima Yakovlev in the first reading. Next year, dozens of Russian officials in uniform and without will not be able to travel to the USA and use their dollar accounts, wherever they are open. Next in line - Canada and the EU countries

Senator Joe Lieberman at the discussion of the Magnitsky act in the US Congress

In early November, the New Times was heard in the editorial office of The New Times. Larisa Litvinova, a Butyrka pre -trial detention center, called, accused by the Russian femid of the death of Sergei Magnitsky, but the expiration of the statute of limitations avoided punishment. She was either too excited, or not entirely sober, complained that she was getting less than the Moscow concierge at a new job, said that her husband throws it because of the story with Magnitsky, and the son, who is studying in the States, blames that she would prevent him from making a career, because the sanctions under the Magnitsky law can potentially extend to relatives.

120 days

However, if Larisa was worried about her son, then other heroes of history with Hermitage Capital have no less problems. Thus, the film “Uzkazamyy” widespread on the Internet reports that after an illegal return of taxes from the budget in the amount of 5.4 billion rubles, to which Sergei Magnitsky, Olga Stepanova, the head of the Moscow IFTS No. 28 in 2001-2011, and her husband Vladlen called the villas in Dubai and Montenegro, as well as $ 11 million in the accounts of the Switzarsky. Credit Suisse. At the same time, accounts were opened to two offshore companies registered in Cyprus and British Virgin Islands. Stepanov himself denies the criminal origin of wealth, claiming that he earned money in business. He even won a lawsuit to protect the honor and dignity of Alexei Navalny, who posted information about Stepanov's foreign property on his blog. Currently, the Zurich millions have been arrested at the request of the Prosecutor General of Switzerland, which conducts an investigation as part of a criminal case of money laundering. But even if the Stepanovs did not have the funds that were not found by the lawyers of Hermitage Capital, and many other Russian officials will now not be easy to dispose of their avoirs: from the moment of signing the Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012), Obama will have 120 days to ensure Form the first one in a different list.

Candidates for mischief

Initially, it was expected that the sanctions would concern only officials involved in the death of Sergei Magnitsky, in particular, defendants in the so -called list of Senator Cardin, compiled in hot pursuit in 2010 and numbering 60 people. But the list managed to become obsolete. For example, Olga Stepanova does not indicate in the Number, but the husband Vladlen is not, which does not mean that American sanctions pass him. In addition, American lawmakers decided to look at things wider. Already the current text of the law mentions the second trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Plato Lebedev, the unsolved murders of Natalia Estemirova, Anna Politkovskaya, Maksharip Aushev, Paul Khlebnikov and other journalists and human rights activists. And also - death in the prison of Vera Trifonova, the beating of Oleg Kashin and Mikhail Beketov and even an unfair condemnation of entrepreneur Alexei Kozlov. So far, there are no responsible names in the text of the law: only the criteria are defined by which people will be included in the list. By the way, these are not only officials involved in violations of human rights or corruption, but also those who interfered with investigations, that is, employees of the prosecutor's office and the neighboring committee, as well as the judge. Listing examples of human rights violations in Russia, the Magnitsky act directly mentions the “illegal actions of the Government of the Russian Federation, including the Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov.” The latter, thus, became the 61st famous personnel list of Congress*.

In order to get to the list, it is not at all necessary to systematically violate human rights: it will be replenished with officials involved in restricting rights to freedom of speech, conscience and even democratic elections. That is, the chairman of the CEC Vladimir Churov may well be in the neighborhood of the Stepanovs couple and Ramzan Kadyrov.

Russian agents

The Stepanov spouses in 2010 officially made a divorce, telling the press that they have not been living together since the beginning of the 90s. However, the Magnitsky act provided for such cases. It follows from his text that sanctions automatically apply to spouses and minor children, but the rest of relatives and friends can fall under the category of “agents” acting on behalf of the defendants or simply disposing of corruption money (§ 404, paragraph 3). So, Larisa Litvinova may not worry about his son, if he really received a grant from the university or any fund for studying at the American University. “It is another matter if it turns out that he himself pays for his training, and his parents are unlikely to allow this: in this case, he is likely to come home,” explained The New Times in the office of Senator-Democrat Benjamin Cardin, who initiated the adoption of the law.

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Today, Russian officials massively withdraw laundered money from Switzerland to Hong Kong

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However, the matter will not be limited to today's text: senators, members of the House of Representatives or Committee and Commission of Congress will be able to raise the issue of making new defendants in the list, based on publications in the media or NGO reports. “It may seem to someone that the American Congress begins to duplicate the European Court of Human Rights, but this is an illusion, the United States does not create a new judicial authority,” the interlocutor of the magazine in the office of Senator Cardin's office explained on the conditions of anonymity. -There will be no special office in the American embassy in Moscow where you can write that your rights have been violated. You just need to shout about it as louder as possible, contact Russian and international human rights organizations so that your business will receive maximum publicity. ” But what if someone with the help of the media will take the counts in this way? The law says: for making in the list we need irrefutable evidence that will be taken from a wide variety of sources.

Do not hide your money

Russian corrupt officials amusing themselves with illusions, including publicly: they say, we are all the same in the Emirates, we are resting without American visas ... But they are cunning: the law tightly closes the US financial system for them, and with it the opportunity to place their money in most international banks, wherever their offices are, and in general use the dollar as a payment means.

All transactions in foreign currency are carried out through clearing centers of the issuing country. “If you have a dollar counter, say, in Alfa Bank, these dollars are physically not in Moscow,” explains Ivan Cherkasov, partner of Hermitage Capital, “Alfa-Bank holds them on his correspondent account in an American bank, for example, in Bank of New York, which, in turn, has an account in the federal reserve system The USA, which is an analogue of the Central Bank. " When paying for a third party or a simple payment by a credit card tied to a dollar account, these funds will pass through the US territory, so the Fed will see the name of the payer and if the corresponding order of the American Ministry of Finance will be blocked until the circumstances are clarified. The same applies to companies belonging to the defendants of the Magnitsky list. It doesn’t matter whether they are registered in offshore or are acting in Russia - about dollar transactions, and with the possible adoption of similar laws in Europe, about the euro and pounds of sterling will have to be forgotten.

In order to avoid immediate arrest of money, the defendants of the law will have to place them in risky banks, currencies and countries in the point of view of financial stability

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It would seem that transfer their money to Vladlen Stepanov, the owner of the arrested $ 11 million, to Swiss francs or Japanese yen - and that’s all, the exit was found. It wasn't there! “The fact is that the list of Magnitsky is an open document. When receiving a new client, any bank checks it both in closed international systems, for example, World Check, and in open sources, ”explains Ivan Cherkasov. “On the surnames of the defendants in the list there is already an appropriate note, so that any self -respecting bank will simply refuse to open accounts or politely ask to close the existing ones.”

According to Cherkasov, earlier the majority of money laundered from Russia went along the standard path: Russia is the former union republics, such as Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, Switzerland. Today, Russian officials massively bring their savings to Hong Kong: it does not fall under the jurisdiction of the United States or the EU, but it is a fairly stable financial center. However, this Eldorado will not be able to be a faithful refuge for the defendants in the Magnitsky law: international banks in Hong Kong will most likely refuse them to open accounts, so you will have to contact Chinese institutions. But they have recently also very much biably studying customers: it will not work for a long time to keep money in one place ...

“The walls are compressed. In order to avoid immediate arrest of money, the defendants in the law will have to place them in risky banks, currencies and countries from the point of view of financial stability, they have practically no opportunity to invest and acquire assets, ”says Ivan Cherkasov.

Responsive blow

The symmetrical response of Russian parliamentarians to Magnitsky’s law was not long in coming. On December 11, deputies Sergey Naryshkin, Gennady Zyuganov, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, Sergey Mironov and Vladimir Vasiliev introduced a bill “On measures of influence on persons involved in the violation of the rights of citizens of the Russian Federation”, Vladimir Putin supported the initiative. At the same time, however, he made a reservation that the answer should be "adequate, but not beyond." Initially, it was about employees of special services involved in abductions and illegal deprivations, so that the response law was immediately christened by the Butt ** list.

But one Buta apparently did not seem enough to our deputies, and they decided to rename the Russian analogue of Magnitsky’s list of Dima Yakovlev ***, banning the entry into Russia to Americans involved in the deaths of adopted Russian children, as well as officials who "helped them to avoid responsibility." The deputy from the “United Russia” and the dean of the faculty of public administration of Moscow State University Vyacheslav Nikonov from the authorship of such a name of the Law. “This is a product of collective creativity, which was cooked for several months,” he answered the New Times.

The deputy and member of the coordination council of the opposition, Dmitry Gudkov, who has not supported the initiative, is sure that lawmakers act to the detriment of themselves on the principle of "spite my mother will freeze my ears." One way or another, the response law, according to Sergei Naryshkin, will be adopted until December 21. As in the American version of the law, Russia will refuse violators in entry visas, and will also arrest their property on its territory. However, experts say that there will be no real effect from the innovation, and the initiative is more likely to cause political hype. On conditions of anonymity, this was indirectly confirmed by the source of The New Times in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs: “We were surprised to learn from the press that [Alexei] Pushkov (head of the State Duma Committee for International Affairs. - The NEW Times) is known about a certain“ black list ”of the Foreign Ministry, drawn up according to the law of Dima Yakovlev. We have no list. ” However, according to the sources of the magazine in the Russian Foreign Ministry, high-ranking American officials involved in human rights in Guantanamo, in particular, mentioned in the report by Human Rights Watch, former vice-president Dick Cheini, former defense minister Donald Donald George Jordge tenet, can still get into the black list. Former US Secretary of State Kondoliza Rice and Colin Powell, as well as former Prosecutor General John Eshcroft. In any case, their names are present in the report of the Russian Foreign Ministry on the situation with human rights in the United States, which appeared on October 22.

The chairman of the Just Russia party, deputy Nikolai Levichv told The NEW Times that the Yakovlev list would be closed, as well as the Magnitsky list. The deputy was mistaken: the whole point of Magnitsky’s list is in his publicity, that the world knew the names of those who are guilty of the deaths of people and illegal prison dates. And only some surnames, as explained to the magazine in the office of Senator Cardin, can be classified - if their publication can open sources of information or threaten the activities of American special services.

A separate question is how the law of Dima Yakovlev can affect business ties between Russia and the USA. After all, many American officials, upon completion of the service, go to business, and then it suddenly turns out that in the civil service they, according to the Russian version, were involved in violation of human rights. While Moscow is in a hurry to assure the American business community that there is nothing to worry about-everything will remain as before. “Last week in New York, I met with Igor Shuvalov (First Deputy Prime Minister of the Government of the Russian Federation.“ The NEW Times), ”said Edward Verona, president and general director of the American-Russian business council. - He said that Russia will certainly respond to the Act of Magnitsky. But he assured me that this would not affect the business in any way. ”

European prospects

The last paragraph of the Magnitsky Law (§407 Report to Congress) gives the executive power of the United States (in this case the State Department) by the obligation of lobbying similar acts in other countries. However, America has long been conducting this work. In the near future, the Magnitsky law should be adopted in Canada and EU countries. According to the source of The New Times in one of the European embassies in Moscow, the Cardin list is already in mind: none of his defendants can receive a Schengen or British visa. The official ban, including transactions in euros, will not be long in coming. “There is already a resolution of the European Parliament, calling for the EU countries to adopt the relevant laws,” reminded by The New Times, a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the European Parliament Christine Ouland. - Next year, foreign ministers should meet and come to a single decision on the Magnitsky act. We believe that the European act must repeat the document adopted in the United States, that is, to provide both visa and financial sanctions ”****.

In a word, every year the mistress and Mr. Stepanovs, as well as other defendants in all kinds of lists, will be less and less places for travel and storage of “savings”. The walls are really compressed.

Photo: Yuri Gritas/Kommersant