[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 82 (Monday, June 22, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H4882-H4883]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




    PLIGHT OF ALEXANDER NIKITIN HAS BROAD INTERNATIONAL IMPLICATIONS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 21, 1997, the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Skaggs) is 
recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SKAGGS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to bring to my colleagues' 
attention the case of Alexander Nikitin, a case that has broad 
implications for the future of democracy, free speech, and the rule of 
law in Russia.
  Nikitin is a retired Russian Navy captain who coauthored this report, 
``The Russian Northern Fleet: Sources of Radioactive Contamination,'' 
published by the environmental group Bellona. The report outlines a 
potential Chernobyl in slow motion from the release of radioactivity in 
the Russian northern fleet's nuclear submarines and storage facilities 
for nuclear waste.
  The report describes an environmental disaster waiting to happen with 
retired and rusting nuclear-powered submarines still containing highly 
radioactive fuel docked at the Kola Peninsula in the Arctic Circle. 
Unprotected nuclear waste reportedly is also stored at bases and 
shipyards near Murmansk.
  Mr. Speaker, if such a report were released about the U.S. fleet, it 
would be a national scandal. Clearly, this report, if published during 
the Communist rule of the Soviet Union, would have been repressed and 
its author charged with treason.
  Unfortunately, that is exactly what has happened in Russia today. The 
report is banned and Nikitin has been charged with treason and 
releasing State secrets. This despite the fact that all the information 
in the report was taken from open, documented sources.
  The saga of Nikitin's legal trouble is a sorry one. He was arrested 
and jailed for almost a year. Then he was released as the various 
investigations proceeded, but not allowed to travel outside of St. 
Petersburg. He was charged incredibly on six separation occasions

[[Page H4883]]

for violating six different sets of secret decrees.
  Most recently on May 8, Russia's General Prosecutor charged Nikitin 
with treason, for the first time, and for releasing state secrets for 
the seventh time, but is no longer basing the charges on secret 
decrees. Rather than a victory for the rule of law, however, this new 
development is an even more egregious abuse because the charges are now 
based on exactly nothing. There were no public decrees defining secrets 
at time Nikitin allegedly revealed them, so the prosecutor has now 
violated the most fundamental principle of the rule of law: that one 
cannot be charged for a crime that was not defined at the time it 
happened.

                              {time}  1245

  These charges represent a very disturbing return to the old Soviet 
ways of prosecuting someone to repress and intimidate them.
  One might ask, why should we care about this? There are many reasons. 
The world's environment belongs to all of us and a Chernobyl in slow 
motion should be of grave concern to the whole world. More 
specifically, for the U.S. Congress, we should be concerned because the 
United States is assisting Russia in building a facility in Murmansk 
for processing nuclear waste.
  But it is what this case says about Russia today that should be of 
equal concern. Will Russian citizens really have the right to free 
speech? Will they be able to publish reports critical of the government 
without being arrested and prosecuted? Can Russia possibly face up to 
its massive environmental problems if it does not even want to hear 
about them? Will the rule of law emerge in Russia?
  I ask my colleagues to join me in speaking out about this case, as 
many already have, sending letters to President Yeltsin as well as to 
Vice President Gore and Secretary of State Albright. I will be seeking 
an appointment with Russia's Ambassador to the United States to discuss 
the case, and I hope some colleagues will join me there as well.
  There is too much at stake here--Russia's continuing progress as a 
free market, democratic country with the rule of law as its basis--too 
much at stake to ignore this critical case.

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