[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 57 (Thursday, April 19, 2012)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E594-E595]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        SERGEI MAGNITSKY RULE OF LAW ACCOUNTABILITY ACT OF 2012

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. JAMES P. McGOVERN

                            of massachusetts

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, April 19, 2012

  Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I first learned of the case of Sergei 
Magnitsky two years ago at a hearing of the Tom Lantos Human Rights 
Commission. At that hearing, a witness described the brutal torture and 
vicious mistreatment by Russian authorities of Mr. Magnitsky, a 
courageous man of integrity who paid the ultimate price for speaking 
out publicly about massive corruption in Russia. Today, the Russian 
government has still held no one accountable for this outrageous crime.
  The facts of the Magnitsky case are simply shocking. Mr. Magnitsky, a 
bright young tax lawyer, uncovered evidence of a criminal conspiracy 
involving public officials who stole $230 million from the Russian 
treasury. In August 2008, Mr. Magnitsky testified about this tax fraud 
scheme before Russian authorities and implicated high-level officials 
in the conspiracy.
  This honesty and courage led Mr. Magnitsky to be arrested and, 
perversely, charged with the crimes he had helped to expose. He was 
kept in pretrial detention in inhuman conditions for almost a year, and 
was tortured by officials who pressured him to retract his damning 
testimony. He refused to do so, but his health badly broke down as a 
result of his abuse. As he developed serious medical problems, 
including pancreatitis and gallstones, Russian authorities refused to 
provide him with medical care. Eventually, he fell into critical 
condition, and when that happened, rather than treating him, prison 
guards chained him to a bed and beat him for one hour and eighteen 
minutes, resulting in his death.
  The response of Russian authorities to these crimes has been as 
outrageous as the crimes themselves. After Mr. Magnitsky died, the 
Russian government said he had never complained about his health in 
prison, even though he had made more than 20 official requests for 
medical attention. Russian authorities have still not held anyone 
accountable for his arrest, abuse, and death. As if to spit on his 
grave, they even absurdly opened a new, groundless criminal case 
against him this year, marking the first posthumous prosecution in 
Russian history.
  Since Russian authorities have not provided justice to Mr. Magnitsky 
and his family, the United States should do what it can to hold 
individuals accountable for these heinous crimes. The bill I am 
introducing today, the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act 
of 2012, would provide a measure of justice for this courageous man by 
imposing a visa ban and asset freeze on the people who participated in 
or covered up his detention, abuse, and death, as well as on those 
individuals who benefited financially from his mistreatment or 
participated in the criminal conspiracy that he uncovered.
  Mr. Speaker, this legislation is about much more than the Magnitsky 
case. In recognition of the many other severe human rights abuses that 
take place each year, the bill also imposes a visa ban and asset freeze 
on other individuals who have committed internationally recognized 
gross violations of human rights against people seeking to expose 
illegal activity by Russian officials or to exercise fundamental rights 
and freedoms.
  In this way, the bill would hold accountable those individuals who 
have perpetrated grave abuses against other whistleblowers or 
government critics, such as Anna Politkovskaya, Natalia Estemirova, and 
others whose names are less well-known in the United States.
  I am deeply grateful to the bipartisan group of members of Congress 
that supports this legislation and has helped to shape it. These 
members include Representatives Frank Wolf, Sander Levin, Ileana Ros-
Lehtinen, Alcee Hastings, Ed Royce, Jim McDermott, Dan Burton, Gerry 
Connolly, Chris Smith, Edolphus Towns, Peter Roskam, Michael Michaud, 
Joseph Pitts and Charles Rangel.
  I am also deeply grateful to my colleagues in the Senate for their 
leadership on this issue. Senator Ben Cardin has introduced similar

[[Page E595]]

legislation that has attracted over 30 bipartisan cosponsors, and he 
has spoken out eloquently about the legislation's vital importance.
  I would also like to underscore that this effort is far from just a 
U.S. initiative. Similar legislation is being considered in nearly a 
dozen other legislatures around the world. My hope is that the United 
States Congress will be the first, but not the last, legislature to 
enact a Magnitsky human rights law.
  Importantly, these legislative efforts have strong support from the 
Russian human rights community, including opposition leaders such as 
Garry Kasparov, Boris Nemtsov, and Alexei Navalny. As Mr. Navalny 
commented recently, ``Such legislation is not anti-Russian. In fact I 
believe it is pro-Russian. It helps defend us from the criminals who 
kill our citizens, steal our money, and hide it abroad.''
  Enactment of the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act will 
provide the Administration with the tools it needs to hold accountable 
human rights violators and provide an important boost to human rights 
activists and defenders. It will also demonstrate that the protection 
of human rights is a cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy. Our country 
has always been at its best when we stood firmly on the side of people 
seeking to exercise fundamental rights and against the actions of 
governments seeking to repress basic freedoms. This legislation is in 
keeping with that great tradition.

 Fact Sheet on Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012


                     The story of Sergei Magnitsky

  After exposing the largest tax fraud in Russian history, tax lawyer 
Sergei Magnitsky was wrongly arrested and tortured in a Russian prison. 
Six months later he became seriously ill and was denied medical 
attention despite 20 formal requests. On the night of November 16, 
2009, he went into critical condition, but instead of being treated in 
a hospital he was put in an isolation cell, chained to a bed, and 
beaten by eight prison guards for one hour and eighteen minutes, 
resulting in his death. Sergei Magnitsky was 37 years old and left 
behind a wife and two children. Those responsible for this crime have 
yet to be punished, and the Magnitsky story is emblematic of 
corruption, human rights abuses, and impunity in Russia.


                           The Magnitsky bill

  The Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012 would 
hold accountable Magnitsky's killers and other human rights violators 
by placing targeted sanctions on them. In particular, the draft bill 
imposes a visa ban and asset freeze on: 1) individuals responsible for 
participating in or covering up Magnitsky's detention, abuse, and 
death, and 2) individuals responsible for other gross violations of 
human rights against people seeking to expose illegal activity by 
Russian officials or to exercise fundamental rights and freedoms.
  The bill requires the Secretary of State, in consultation with the 
Secretary of the Treasury, to publish a list of the people who should 
be subject to sanctions under its provisions, and requires the 
Secretary of State to respond within 120 days to requests from the 
chairperson and ranking member of key congressional committees to add 
an individual to that list. The bill provides the executive branch with 
the authority to waive the sanctions on national security grounds, and 
requires the executive to submit an annual report to Congress on 
actions taken to implement it.
  The bill includes findings on the mistreatment of Magnitsky and other 
individuals, and on the extent of corruption and impunity in Russia.
  The bill updates H.R. 1575, a bipartisan bill introduced by Rep. 
McGovern in 2011. The new bill improves on H.R. 1575 by placing 
sanctions on a broader range of human rights violators (rather than 
only on people involved in Magnitsky-related abuses), by requiring the 
executive to publish the list of sanctioned individuals, and by giving 
key members of Congress the ability to request that people be added to 
the list. A similar bill, introduced as S. 1039 by Sen. Cardin, has 
attracted over 30 bipartisan cosponsors in the Senate.

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