Press Release

26 July 2013 – Today, the General Secretariat of Interpol has announced that Interpol cannot be used by the Russian Federation to arrest William Browder, who is running a global justice campaign to sanction Russian officials responsible for the torture and murder of 37-year old lawyer Sergei Magnitsky.

“INTERPOL cannot be used by the Russian Federation to seek the arrest of Mr William Browder,” said Interpol’s General Secretariat in the official announcement posted on its website (http://www.interpol.int/News-and-media/News-media-releases/2013/N20130726).

The public statement from Interpol came a day after the Russian Interior Ministry announced that it had sent a request to Interpol to search for Mr Browder on orders from the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office. The news of the Russian authorities targeting Mr Browder with one more international search warrant was covered by 139 news outlets in several hours since its release.

This morning Interpol’s General Secretariat refused the Russian Federation’s request to search for and arrest Mr Browder in order to extradite him back to Russia because the Russian proceedings in relation to Mr Browder have already been found by the Interpol’s governing bodies to be “of a predominantly political nature” and “contrary to INTERPOL’s rules and regulations” following a review held in May 2013 by the Interpol’s Commission for the Control of Files. In accordance with the Commission’s recommendation, the General Secretariat of Interpol has deleted all information related to the Russian request concerning Mr Browder from its information systems.

All information related to this request for Mr Browder’s arrest has been deleted from INTERPOL’s databases and all INTERPOL member countries have been informed accordingly,” said Interpol’s General Secretariat in its official statement.

“It is remarkable that Putin has become so desperate to persecute whistleblowers that he is ready to humiliate himself and Russia in front of key international organizations. The fast response from INTERPOL in this case is an indication that it has put in place effective systems to protect themselves from Putin’s attemtps to draw them into his own corrupt political vendettas”,said a Hermitage Capital representative.

For further information, please see:

Law and Order in Russia

Author: Impunity Watch Archive