Paul Rusesabagina Remarks, 2011 Lantos Prize

My dear friends of the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, please help me to thank Ms. Katrina Lantos Swett and the entire staff and Board Members of the Lantos Foundation for their conviction to human rights. They have stood up to threats and protests designed to silence our pleas for human rights and freedom in my beloved Rwanda.

My dear friends, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, I am deeply, deeply humbled to receive the prestigious Lantos Foundation Human Rights Award. I am an ordinary man. I feel incredibly honored to be elevated to the same class as His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Professor Elie Wiesel, who have received this award before me. Please help me to thank these 2 distinguished and towering figures who have contributed so much to the advancement of humanity. (Applause) They are now high on the list of my mentors, and I hope they will be kind enough to share with me their precious knowledge and wisdom. As I receive this award, I ask you join me in committing to the idea that never again must mean never again.

In 1994, I watched my country dissolve into chaos and mayhem.  I was a hotel manager, not a soldier nor a politician. Still, I listened to the little voice inside me, my conscience, and tried to do everything that I could to stop the violence and to shelter the 1,268 who had come to my hotel for shelter. Some who at first could pay, some who just ran to us for safety, but we all made it through hell.  I am proud to say that the Milles Collines Hotel was the only public place in Rwanda where no one died, no one was beaten and everyone who sought shelter made it through the Genocide alive.

Today I tell my story – the story of those who died during the terrible genocide in Rwanda in 1994. Over 400,000 Tutsis. Another 400,000 Hutus. I try to provide a voice to the voiceless. As you may know, a humanitarian can often measure his success by how harshly his work is criticized, and my critics often say that I deny the genocide. Nothing can be further from the truth. I am here as a living testament to that genocide. To those who died. To provide testimony about the horrible people in that Hutu elite government, in the military, and in the militias who caused those deaths. The genocide was a terrible, defining moment in my life and in that of my country. And it must not be forgotten.

17 years after the genocide , we don’t have two armies fighting to the death for power control, nor do we have roving gangs of militiamen killing innocent villagers by the thousands every 10 minutes. We have a country that, on the surface, appears to be peaceful. But it is a country with no space for political dissent or real democratic action. The potential violence is just below the surface.  As the human rights abuses spread and media suppression grows, things get more dangerous. I am calling upon the international community to work with me for a truth and reconciliation process to break the historic cycle of violence in Rwanda and replace it with sustainable peace.

But what I have found over the years is that Rwanda has unfortunately not changed so much. The leaders who caused the genocide are now gone, and this is an excellent thing. But Rwanda has new leaders now, and as we say in Kinyarwanda, the dancers have changed, but the music stays the same.

Now I spend my time as a humanitarian. Reminding people that we must never forget. And saddened that we forget all too often.

In addition to talking about 1994, I also cannot stay silent about what is happening in Rwanda today. Freedom of speech and freedom of the press do not exist. Political oppression is the norm. Opposition leaders are arrested and killed. Today in Rwanda, leaders insist that a dictatorship is necessary to safeguard the people. In fact, as with all dictatorship it only serves to safeguard itself.

And the current government – the government that we all believed in 1994 had saved Rwanda from the genocide – is now responsible for unthinkable violence next door in the Congo. Over six million people dead in a war driven by conflict minerals. With so much that the United Nations says that war crimes have been committed by the current Rwandan government. Crimes against humanity. And possibly even a new genocide.

I see my native country, the home of my heart, and I cannot stay silent. I fear that it is now a dormant volcano, waiting to erupt again.

As Katrina knows only too well, raising my voice comes at a price. During the genocide I and my family were often in terrible danger. Now, I am threatened once again on a regular basis.

It seems that authoritarian leaders do not appreciate the work of humanitarians. And sometimes they will go to extreme means to stop it. But the preparation for this award has made me realize though that I am not alone. I want to very much thank Katrina and everyone at the Lantos Foundation not just for this award, but for their support in recent weeks. As the Rwandan government and its advocates tried to silence my voice, they were steadfast in standing up for what was right. In standing up for free speech, and for the prospect of truth, reconciliation and peace in my native Rwanda. They stood up for the power of words to heal our differences. With a few more people like those at the Lantos Foundation, the world will be a much better place.

In closing, I would like to leave you with the words of a great man, Mr. Albert Einstein. He said:

“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.”

I hope you will join me in saying that never again must mean never again. I hope you will join me in doing something when we see evil. In confronting it. I hope you will join me in being ordinary people, who take every opportunity to do the right thing.

I thank you all for listening to my words today. And I thank the Lantos Foundation from the bottom of my heart for this award. Thank you.

Democracy Denied - Op-ed By: Katrina Lantos Swett

A month ago, there was a surprising moment at a sporting match in Russia when Vladimir Putin was booed in public for the first time in anyone’s memory. This brief episode turned out to be a small revelatory event that unmasked a significant truth: the Russian people were determined to reclaim their democracy.

Unfortunately, their chance at a true democracy was denied during Sunday’s Duma elections which were neither free nor fair. Even Mikhail Gorbachev has now denounced the elections as fraudulent.  Apart from rampant ballot stuffing and widespread reports of people voting at multiple polling places, there were many other forms of intimidation intended to gain votes for Putin’s United Russia party, including harassment and fines for Russia’s independent election monitoring group, Golos, and the shut-down of popular internet media sites.

Though these efforts produced laughable results from outlying regions where United Russia received over 99% of the vote out of seven parties on the ballot, overall Putin’s party only garnered 49.5% nationwide.  One would think that if you worked so diligently to steal an election, you should go big or go home.

It is well known that much of the election tampering took place before a single ballot was cast. The most credible and vibrant opposition parties were prohibited from running in the elections, and the country’s entire media apparatus was used as a propaganda machine for Putin’s United Russia.  As one independent Swiss election monitor said, “These elections were like a game in which only some players were allowed to play, and on top of it the field was tilted in favor of one of the players.”

When the Russian people gave their verdict on this outrageous and undemocratic manipulation, their answer was a resounding rejection of much more than electoral fraud. They were saying no to the rampant corruption that characterizes the current Russian government at every level. They were saying no to the shadow war against the free press that has seen more than 150 journalists who sought to expose government misdeeds slain under highly suspicious circumstances. They were saying no to the “legal nihilism” in which the Judiciary is used as an instrument for persecution and blackmail by the government. And perhaps they were also saying no to the slanderous historic notion that the Russian people want a strong Tsar to rule and protect them instead of a vibrant democracy.

In the aftermath of last week’s election, one thing is clear. VladimirPutin has lost much of his legitimacy and perhaps his inevitability as well.  Unfortunately, this message is not sitting well with the current government.  This week major pro-democracy demonstrations have taken place in Moscow and the regime has reacted with mass arrests and the movement of additional security forces into the Capitol.

Today Russia finds itself at a cross-road, and it must move towards genuine democracy or towards greater repression.   As Americans, we must support the Russian people in their pursuit of freedom and democracy, both for their sake and for ours.  Let us hope that the on-coming Russian winter will not freeze the new signs of a “Russian spring.”

Link for cspan video

Remarks by Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett; Lantos Prize Event 2011

Good Morning, I am Katrina Lantos Swett and along with my sister Annette and my mother Annette, it is my pleasure to welcome you to the 2011 Lantos Human Rights Prize award ceremony. Many years ago when I was a very young, newly minted lawyer working on Capitol Hill for then Senator Joe Biden, I was being romantically pursued by another Hill staffer. This young man, who shall remain nameless, had the most thought provoking pick-up line that I was ever on the receiving end of. And although I never actually went out on a date with him, I also never forgot his question. It was the following:

“If tonight as you prepare to go to bed, the light in your room grows brighter and brighter and you find yourself miraculously in the presence of God and He tells you, I will answer any single question for you; what would you ask? I thought long and hard about how I would use such a precious opportunity. I didn’t want to ask a question that I probably already knew the answer to such as what is the greatest thing in life? Love! Or how can we achieve peace and reconciliation? Forgiveness and mutual understanding.

In the end I decided I would ask God a very personal question because I believe that to the extent he works in this world, it is most often through us. And so the question I determined I would ask was: “What will be the greatest moral challenge I will face in my life and will I be equal to it? Will I meet it in a way that makes you proud?” Our honoree this year, Mr. Paul Rusesabagina, has answered that question and has done so resoundingly in the affirmative.

World renowned author, Nobel Laureate and last year’s recipient of the Lantos Prize, Professor Elie Wiesel has written that “Wherever men or women are persecuted because of their race, religion or political views, that place must, at that moment, become the center of the universe” Seventeen years ago when Rwanda desperately needed to be the center of the universe the world instead turned away. As a genocidal assault was unleashed on the Tutsi people, the community of nations, to their everlasting shame, stood by and did nothing and as a consequence nearly a million Rwandans were massacred in just 100 days. But while the mighty and powerful found reasons and excuses to turn away, Paul Rusesabagina, a self-described “ordinary man” did not turn away. Paul’s brave and profoundly decent actions as the manager of the Hotel Des Milles Collines, helped save the lives of over 1,200 hundred Tutsis and moderate Hutus who had taken refuge in his hotel.

What is remarkable about Paul Rusesabagina’s achievement is that it was not the result of a grandiose plan to thwart the evil that was raging outside the gates of his hotel. No not at all. Paul would be the first to say that minute to minute – day to day- making it up as he went along, he was simply determined to do one more thing to try and save lives for one more day. Where did he find the strength and humanity to do this-to live out the idea that he was indeed his brothers’ and sisters’ keepers? I don’t know, but I do know that we can perhaps hope to find similar strength and humanity from following his example.

Paul’s story is one that particularly resonates with my family because it reminds us of the heroic rescue mission of the Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, who saved tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews during the Holocaust, including my father Tom Lantos. In 2012 we will celebrate the centennial of Raoul Wallenberg’s birth and it is fitting indeed that Paul has previously been awarded the Wallenberg medal for his outstanding humanitarian actions on behalf of the defenseless.

I spoke earlier of wanting to inquire of God what might be the great moral test of my life. Paul met his great test and he would have been more than justified in seeking a life of quiet and peace in which he could be recognized for his good works but also left alone to enjoy the simple ordinary pleasures of his family and friends. Perhaps it is not surprising that Paul instead chose the path less travelled and more fraught with risk. While recognizing the significant progress that has been made in Rwanda under President Kagame, Paul has nonetheless dared to speak out against the serious challenges to democracy and human rights that exist in Rwanda today. His call for a peace and reconciliation process is the right prescription for a country that still faces deep rooted tensions that, if not addressed could pose a serious risk to the people of this region who have already suffered so much. Sadly, Paul’s willingness to publicly confront these issues has made him the target of bitter attacks on his character and motives. Unfortunately these attacks appear to be consistent with a disturbing pattern of censorship, intimidation and even violence that has been directed against those who have dared voice concerns about the government of Rwanda. This pattern is not unique to Rwanda. As Mark Twain observed, history may not repeat itself but it often rhymes. Raoul Wallenberg was arrested and sent to the Soviet Gulag for his heroic deeds during the Holocaust, Martin Luther King Jr. who was hailed in America when he became the youngest Nobel Laureate, became the subject of bitter denunciation when he spoke out against our involvement in the Viet Nam war, and last year’s recipient of the Nobel prize, the Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, languishes in a Chinese prison for daring to write about a democratic future for his country. I suppose we could say that Paul is in good company and as he told me just a few weeks ago, “I am not threatened and I will not be silent” As Charlie Clements, the director of the Harvard Carr Center for human rights said recently: “It has never been Paul Rusesabagina’s nature to stay in his place. He would not have saved lives in the hotel had he stayed in his role as hotel manager”

We are so proud at the Lantos Foundation to be adding our recognition to the many others that Paul has rightly received. This “extra” ordinary man never wielded a gun, never swung a machete, but he used his words and his humanity to find a small path in the darkness and helped hundreds of his fellow human beings follow that path to safety. Paul Rusesabagina has set a path for us to follow as well.

Thank you very much.

Lantos Foundation Responds to Protests

CONCORD, NH – Katrina Lantos Swett, President of The Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice, responded today to a protest staged in opposition to the upcoming award of the 2011 Tom Lantos Human Rights Prize to Rwandan humanitarian Paul Rusesabagina:

“The protest staged today is only the latest attempt to smear the good name of this year’s Lantos Prize recipient, Paul Rusesabagina.  These protests were not staged when the Oscar-nominated film “Hotel Rwanda” was released, nor were they staged when Paul received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Bush.  It was only once he started to speak out about the need for more freedom and democracy in Rwanda, including a Truth and Reconciliation process, that these attacks were suddenly manufactured. Unfortunately these attacks appear to be consistent with a disturbing pattern of censorship, intimidation and even violence that has been directed at those who have dared voice concerns about the government of Rwanda. This pattern is not unique to Rwanda. Other authoritarian regimes have responded in a similar fashion.  

The most recent high profile example happened in 2010, when the Chinese government vehemently protested the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo and tried to bully governments into boycotting the Prize ceremony.  The irony of such manufactured protests is that, in the end, they only serve to provide a brighter spotlight to the intended target. 

As the child of Holocaust survivors, I, along with the Lantos Foundation staff, have made particular efforts to listen to the concerns of Rwandan genocide survivors who have contacted us. While many have thanked us for our decision to honor Paul Rusesabagina, there are others who have expressed contrary views.   We have spent hours talking to these individuals by phone and email, and even meeting with some in person.  The bottom-line is that the more we speak to them, the more it becomes painfully obvious that there is a “script” in place.  This script is at times absurd and at other times petty. They accuse Paul of denying the genocide when in fact he has devoted his life to telling the awful story of Rwanda’s genocide and working to achieve genuine peace and reconciliation. They complain that Paul charged the guests who found refuge in the hotela fact that Paul readily shares in his book, in person and in the movie Hotel Rwanda- money was needed to feed the 1200 people living in the hotel and to bribe the ever murderous gangs that prowled outside the hotel gates. At the end of the day, it seems that his real offense in their eyes, is that he has been outspoken in defense of democracy in Rwanda even in the face of determined efforts to silence him.

 We did not intend to cause controversy with this year’s Lantos Prize, but it seems the controversy has found us anyway.  We did not intend to step into the political disagreements that are currently swirling in and around Rwanda, but it seems we are not able to avoid that either.  We originally chose Paul Rusesabagina as the Lantos Prize recipient purely based on his heroic actions during the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, not for his work since then through the Hotel Rwanda Rusesabagina Foundation.   But we now find ourselves quite in awe of Paul’s willingness to stand up and speak out for freedoms in his home country, despite the backlash that work has caused.

In the end, the most poignant take away from today’s events is that the very freedom to take part in these protests is something that wouldn’t be allowed in Rwanda under the current government.  Paul Rusesabagina is simply asking for his native country to experience the same of freedom and openness that we deeply value here in America.”     

The Lantos Foundation established the Lantos Human Rights Prize in 2009 to honor and bring attention to heroes of the human rights movement. It is awarded annually to an individual or organization that best exemplifies the Foundation’s mission, namely to be a vital voice standing up for the values of decency, dignity, freedom, and justice in every corner of the world. The prize also serves to commemorate the late Congressman Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor ever elected to the U.S. Congress and a prominent advocate for human rights during his nearly three decades as a U.S. Representative.  Former recipients of the Lantos Prize include His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel.  This year’s award will be presented to Paul Rusesabagina in Washington, DC on November 16th.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky: Full Transcript of his Final Words

I can recall October 2003. My last day as a free man. Several weeks after my arrest, I was informed that president Putin had decided: I was going to have to “slurp gruel” for 8 years. It was hard to believe that back then.

Seven years have gone by already since that day. Seven years – quite a long stretch of time, and all the more so - when you’ve
spent it in jail. All of us have had time to reassess and rethink many things.

Judging by the prosecutors’ presentation: “give them 14 years” and “spit on previous court decisions”, over these years they have begun to fear me more, and to respect the law - even less.

The first time around, they at least went through the effort of first repealing the judicial acts that stood in their way. Now - they’ll just leave them be; especially since they would need to repeal not two, but more than 60 decisions.

I do not want to return to the legal side of the case at this time. Everybody who wanted to understand something – has long since understood everything. Nobody is seriously waiting for an admission of guilt from me. It is hardly likely that somebody today would believe me if I were to say that I really did steal all the oil produced by my company.

But neither does anybody believe that an acquittal in the YUKOS case is possible in a Moscow court. Notwithstanding, I want to talk to you about hope. Hope – the main thing in life.

I remember the end of the ’80s of the last century. I was 25 then. Our country was living on hope of freedom, hope that we would be able to achieve happiness for ourselves and for our children.

We lived on this hope. In some ways, it did materialise, in others – it did not. The responsibility for why this hope was not realized all the way, and not for everybody, probably lies on our entire generation, myself included.

I remember too the end of the last decade and the beginning of the present, current one. By then I was 35. We were building the best oil company in Russia. We were putting up sports complexes and cultural centres, laying roads, and resurveying and developing dozens of new fields; we started development of the East Siberian reserves and were introducing new technologies. In short, - we were doing all those things that Rosneft, which has taken possession of Yukos, is so proud of today.

Thanks to a significant increase in oil production, including as the result of our successes, the country was able to take advantage of a favourable oil situation. We felt hope that the period of convulsions and unrest – was behind us at last, and that, in the conditions of stability that had been achieved with great effort and sacrifice, we would be able to peacefully build ourselves a new life, a great country.

Alas, this hope too has yet to be justified. Stability has come to look like stagnation. Society has stopped in its tracks. Although hope still lives. It lives on even here, in the Khamovnichesky courtroom, when I am already just this side of 50 years old.

With the coming of a new President (and more than two years have already passed since that time), hope appeared once again for many of my fellow citizens too. Hope that Russia would yet become a modern country with a developed civil society. Free from the arbitrary behaviour of officials, free from corruption, free from unfairness and lawlessness.

It is clear that this can not happen all by itself, or in one day. But to pretend that we are developing, while in actuality, - we are merely standing in one place or sliding backwards, even if it is behind the cloak of noble conservatism, - is no longer possible. Impossible and simply dangerous for the country.

It is not possible to reconcile oneself with the notion that people who call themselves patriots so tenaciously resist any change that impacts their feeding trough or ability to get away with anything. It is enough to recall art. 108 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation - arresting businessmen for filing of tax returns by bureaucrats. And yet it is precisely the sabotage of reforms that is depriving our country of prospects. This is not patriotism, but rather hypocrisy.

I am ashamed to see how certain persons - in the past, respected by me - are attempting to justify unchecked bureaucratic behaviour and lawlessness. They exchange their reputation for a life of ease, privileges and sops.

Luckily, not all are like that, and there are ever more of the other kind.

It makes me proud to know that even after 7 years of persecutions, not a single one of the thousands of YUKOS employees has agreed to become a false witness, to sell their soul and conscience.

Dozens of people have personally experienced threats, have been cut off from family, and have been thrown in jail. Some have been tortured. But, even after losing their health and years of their lives, people have still kept the thing they deemed to be most important, - human dignity.

Those who started this shameful case, - Biryukov, Karimov and others, - have contemptuously called us “entrepreneurs” 
[«kommersanty»], regarding us as low-lifes, capable of anything just to protect our prosperity and avoid prison.

The years have passed. So who are the low-lifes now? Who is it that have lied, tortured, and taken hostages, all for the sake of money and out of cowardice before their bosses?

And this they called “the sovereign’s business” [«gosudarevoye delo»]!

Shameful. I am ashamed for my country.

I think all of us understand perfectly well – the significance of our trial extends far beyond the scope of my fate and Platon’s, and even the fates of all those who have guiltlessly suffered in the course of the sweeping massacre of YUKOS, those I found myself unable to protect, but about whom I remember every day.

Let us ask ourselves: what must be going through the head of the entrepreneur, the high-level organiser of production, or simply any ordinary educated, creative person, looking today at our trial and knowing that its result is absolutely predictable?

The obvious conclusion a thinking person can make is chilling in its stark simplicity: the siloviki bureaucracy can do anything. There is no right of private property ownership. A person who collides with “the system” has no rights whatsoever.

Even though they are enshrined in the law, rights are not protected by the courts. Because the courts are either also afraid, or are themselves a part of “the system”. Should it come as a surprise to anyone then that thinking people do not aspire to selfrealisation here, in Russia?

Who is going to modernise the economy? Prosecutors? Policemen? Chekists? We already tried such a modernization - it did not work. We were able to build a hydrogen bomb, and even a missile, but we still can not build – our own good, modern television, our own inexpensive, competitive, modern automobile, our own modern mobile phone and a whole pile of other modern goods as well.

But then we have learnt how to beautifully display others’ obsolete models produced in our country and an occasional creation of Russian inventors, which, if they ever do find a use, it will certainly be in some other country.

Whatever happened with last year’s presidential initiatives in the realm of industrial policy? Have they been buried? They offer the real chance to kick the oil addiction.

Why? Because what the country needs is not one Korolev, and not one Sakharov under the protective wing of the all-powerful Beria and his million-strong armed host, but hundreds of thousands of “korolevs” and “sakharovs”, under the protection of fair and comprehensible laws and independent courts, which will give these laws life, and not just a place on a dusty shelf, as they did in their day - with the Constitution of 1937.

Where are these “korolevs” and “sakharovs” today? Have they left the country? Are they preparing to leave? Have they once again gone off into internal emigration? Or taken cover amongst the grey bureaucrats in order not to fall under the steamroller of“the system”?

We can and must change this.

How is Moscow going to become the financial centre of Eurasia if our prosecutors, “just like” 20 and 50 years ago, are directly and unambiguously calling in a public trial for the desire to increase the production and market capitalisation of a private company - to be ruled a criminally mercenary objective, for which a person ought to be locked up for 14 years? Under one sentence a company that paid more tax than anyone else, except Gazprom, but still underpaid taxes; and with the second sentence it’s obvious that there’s nothing to tax since the taxable item was stolen.

A country that tolerates a situation where the siloviki bureaucracy holds tens and even hundreds of thousands of talented entrepreneurs, managers, and ordinary people in jail in its own interests, instead of and together with criminals, - this is a sick country.

A state that destroys its best companies, which are ready to become global champions; a country that holds its own citizens in contempt, trusting only the bureaucracy and the special services – is a sick state.

Hope – the main engine of big reforms and transformations, the guarantor of their success. If hope fades, if it comes to be supplanted by profound disillusionment, - who and what will be able to lead our Russia out of the new stagnation?

I will not be exaggerating if I say that millions of eyes throughout all of Russia and throughout the whole world are watching for the outcome of this trial.

They are watching with the hope that Russia will after all become a country of freedom and of the law, where the law will be above the bureaucratic official.

Where supporting opposition parties will cease being a cause for reprisals.

Where the special services will protect the people and the law, and not the bureaucracy from the people and the law.

Where human rights will no longer depend on the mood of the tsar. Good or evil.

Where, on the contrary, the power will truly be dependent on the citizens, and the court – only on law and God. Call this conscience - if you prefer.

I believe, this - is how it will be.

I am not at all an ideal person, but I am - a person with an idea. For me, as for anybody, it is hard to live in jail, and I do not want to die there.

But if I have to - I will not hesitate. The things I believe in are worth dying for. I think I have proven this.

And you opponents? What do you believe in? That the bosses are always right? Do you believe in money? In the impunity of“the system”?

Your Honour!

There is much more than just the fates of two people in your hands. Right here and right now, the fate of every citizen of our country is being decided. Those who, on the streets of Moscow and Chita, Peter and Tomsk, and other cities and settlements, are not counting on becoming victims of police lawlessness, who have set up a business, built a house, achieved success and want to pass it on to their children, not to raiders in uniform, and finally, - those who want to honourably carry out their duty for a fair wage, not expecting that they can be fired at any moment by corrupt bosses under just about any pretext.

This is not about me and Platon – at any rate, not only about us. It is about hope for many citizens of Russia. About hope that tomorrow, the court will be able to protect their rights, if yet some other bureaucrats-officials get it into their head to brazenly and demonstratively violate these rights.

I know, there are people, I have named them in the trial, who want to keep us in jail. To keep us there forever! Indeed, they do not even conceal this, publicly reminding everyone about the existence of a “bottomless” case file.

They want to show: they – are above the law, they will always accomplish whatever they might “think up”. So far they have achieved the opposite: out of ordinary people they have created a symbol of the struggle with arbitrariness. But for them, a conviction is essential, so they would not become “scapegoats”.

I want to hope that the court will stand up to their psychological pressure. We all know through whom it will come.

I want an independent judiciary to become a reality and the norm in my country, I want the phrase from the Soviet times about “the most just court in the world” to stop sounding just as ironic today as they did back then. I want us not to leave the dangerous symbols of a totalitarian system as an inheritance for our children and grandchildren.

Everybody understands that your verdict in this case - whatever it will be – is going to become part of the history of Russia. Furthermore, it is going to form it for the future generation. All the names - those of the prosecutors, and of the judges - will remain in history, just like they have remained in history after the infamous Soviet trials.

Your Honour, I can imagine perfectly well that this must not be very easy at all for you - perhaps even frightening – and I wish you courage!