Subject: Nikitin re-trial, first day
From: Bellona (bellona@bellona.no)
Date: Tue Nov 23 1999 - 16:46:08 EST
St. Petersburg, Nov. 23, 1999
'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The mood among those assembled in the courtroom, over 100 in number
and including several TV teams, seemed a lot more relaxed than one
year ago. With only a short delay, Judge Sergey Y. Golets--the same
as last year--opened the session by saying that this was the second
time his court hears the Nikitin case. According to procedure, those
parts of the proceedings that were carried out the first time will be
repeated now.
Illegal gathering of evidence
'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
Chief defender Yury Schmidt pointed out that several elements of the
evidence presented in the indictment had been gathered in wrongful
ways. He did not ask for any changes to procedure for this reason,
but asked the Court to take this fact into consideration.
Schmidt also said that the indictment is confusing several versions
of the report, these being at least one printed pre-release, one copy
from an un-protocolled floppy disk, and the official release of the
printed report. While this leads to a general confusion when page
numbers are referred to, the floppy version should be considered
non-existent, due to its not having been duly protocolled.
Surprise move by important witness
'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The defence team was temporarily taken aback, when retired Admiral
Chernov, summoned to witness later in the court proceedings, offered
himself as a public defender to join in with Nikitin's counsel.
Dressed in uniform and representing a group of retired naval
officers, Chernov's surprising move did show that Nikitin has strong
support even within the ranks of his former naval colleagues. Both
Nikitin and Schmidt rejected the proposal, though, considering the
Admiral's testimony as witness as more important. This situation
led to an early break, and was resolved just before the court
recessed for the day. Chernov will not act as co-defender, and may
therefore still be called as a witness.
There were no indications as to how long the proceedings will last.
But, starting tomorrow, the doors will be closed to the public while
the court in detail compares the data on various submarines within
the report to those already publicly available. Golets estimated
that this process will last for seven days in court. The proceedings
are generally expected to last some two weeks, to be followed by a
one week pause and a final resolution some time around the 12th of
December. As of now, though, these are only qualified speculations.
The Nikitin Case
----------------
Aleksandr Nikitin is charged with espionage and disclosure of state
secrets while working for the Bellona Foundation. He was arrested by
the FSB on 6 February 1996, after writing two chapters of a Bellona
report on the risks of radioactive pollution from Russia's Northern
Fleet. Jailed for 10 months following his arrest, Nikitin has since
been restricted to the city limits of St. Petersburg. His case was
then tried in St. Petersburg City Court between October 20 and 29,
1998. The St. Petersburg judge's decision to return the case to
further investigation was appealed by both the prosecutor and the
defence. Their respective appeals were heard in the Supreme Court on
4 February 1999.
For latest updates and more background info: http://www.bellona.no/
The Bellona Foundation, Oslo
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