Berezovsky Wins Extradition Battle

Extradition proceedings brought by the Russian Government against the prominent Russian politician and financier Boris Berezovsky and his business colleague Yuli Dubov have been discharged at Bow Street Magistrates Court in London.

Both Mr Berezovsky and Mr Dubov, advised by Carter-Ruck senior partner Andrew Stephenson, maintained that the charges brought against them were bogus, that they were politically motivated and stemmed from Mr Berezovsky's opposition to the current regime in Russia. It was their case that they would not get a fair trial were they to be returned to Russia.

Discharge of the extradition proceedings against Mr Berezovsky came on 12 September, two days after the Home Office granted him refugee status. Refugee status is granted if it can be shown that a person has well founded grounds to fear persecution on political grounds in his home state. Mr Dubov's application for political asylum was granted on 30 September, with the Court discharging the extradition case against him on 7 October.

Mr Berezovsky has been a vocal critic of President Vladimir Putin's policies, in particular with regard to the mass media, the centralisation of power within the Kremlin and the conflict in Chechnya. Now that he has won political asylum, Mr Berezovsky intends to continue to oppose the current regime through the Liberal Russia political party.

This is the second major success senior partner Andrew Stephenson has achieved for Mr Berezovsky this year. In March he settled Mr Berezovsky's libel claim against Forbes magazine. In a statement in open court read on 6 March Mr Justice Gray was told that Forbes had falsely accused Mr Berezovsky of being involved in the murder of political rivals. The magazine accepted that there was no evidence that he was responsible for any murder and it had been wrong to characterise Mr Berezovsky as a mafia boss. Forbes agreed to publish a correction, both in the magazine and on its website. The settlement brought to an end prolonged litigation, which began when court proceedings were issued in February 1997.

Partners Mark Thomson and Claire Gill, and assistant Kate Macmillan worked with Andrew Stephenson on the extradition case, the trial of which had been due to start on 6 October.

STOP PRESS:
Eurobusiness Magazine has apologised to Boris Berezovsky for an article in its October edition. The article falsely accused Mr Berezovsky of running the car distribution firm Logovaz "into the ground" and, with a "mastery of fraudulent accounting", of selling multiple cars with identical plates as a means of keeping "huge profits off the books". Most seriously, the article alleged that Mr Berezovsky has been "accused of murdering liberal Russia party leader Sergei Yushenkov." In a statement in open court on Thursday 30 October Eurobusiness accepted these allegations were untrue and without foundation, and apologised for having made them. Eurobusiness has agreed to pay the sum of £10,000 to Mr Berezovsky, which he will donate to the International Foundation for Civil Liberties, a non-profit organisation which he founded to promote human rights causes in Russia.

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December 2003/January 2004