Mikhail Khodorkovsky - in Prison

In Prison

On 30 May 2005, Mikhail Khodorkovsky was sentenced to 9 years in a medium security prison. At the time, he was detained in Moscow prison Matrosskaya Tishina. On 1 August, a political essay written by Khodorkovsky in his prison cell, titled "Left Turn", was published in Vedomosti, calling for a turn to a more socially responsible state. He stated that "The next Russian administration will have to include the Communist Party of the Russian Federation and the Motherland Party, or the historical successors to these parties. The left-wing liberals, including Yabloko, and right-wing Ryzhkov, Khakamada and others should decide whether to join the broad social-democratic coalition or to remain grumpy and without relevance on the political sidelines. In my opinion, they have to join because only the broadest composition of a coalition in which liberal-socialist (social-democratic) views will play the key role can save us from the emergence, in the process of this turn to the left turn, from a new ultra-authoritarian regime. The new Russian authorities will have to address a left-wing agenda and meet an irrepressible demand by the people for justice. This will mean in the first instance the problems of legalizing privatization and restoring paternalistic programs and approaches in several areas."

On 19 August 2005, Khodorkovsky announced that he was on a hunger strike in protest his friend and associate Platon Lebedev's placement in the punishment cell of the jail. According to Khodorkovsky, Lebedev had diabetes mellitus and heart conditions, and keeping him in the punishment cell would be equivalent to murder.

On 31 August 2005, he announced that he would run for parliament. This initiative was based on the legal loophole: a convicted felon cannot vote or stand for a parliament, but if his case is lodged with the Court of Appeal he still has all the electoral rights. Usually it requires around a year to get an appeal through the Appeal Court, so it should have been enough time for Khodorkovsky to be elected. To imprison a member of Russian parliament, the parliament should vote for stripping his or her immunity. Thus, he had a hope to escape from his prosecution. But the plans were flawed, as the Court of Appeal unusually took only a couple of weeks to process Khodorkovsky's appeal, reduce his sentence by one year and invalidate any of his electoral plans until the end of his sentence.

As reported on 20 October 2005, Khodorkovsky was delivered to the labor camp YaG-14/10 (Исправительное учреждение общего режима ЯГ-14/10) of the town of Krasnokamensk near Chita. The labor camp is attached to a uranium mining and processing plant and during Soviet times had a reputation as a place from which nobody returned alive. According to news reports, prisoners no longer work in uranium mining and have much better chances of survival than in the past. The second part of Khodorkovsky essay/thesis "Left Turn" was published in Kommersant on 11 November 2005, in which he expounded his social democratic manifesto.

On 13 April 2006, Khodorkovsky was attacked by prison mate Alexander Kuchma while he was asleep after a heated conversation. Western media immediately accused the Russian authorities of trying to play down the incident. In January 2009, the same prisoner filed a lawsuit for 500,000 rubles (~$15,000) against Khodorkovsky, accusing him of homosexual harassment.

On 5 February 2007, new charges of embezzlement and money laundering were brought against both Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev. Khodorkovsky's supporters point out that the charges come just months before Khodorkovsky and Lebedev were to become eligible for parole, as well as just a year before the next Russian presidential election.

On 28 January 2008, Khodorkovsky began a hunger strike to help his associate Vasily Aleksanyan, who is ill and was held in jail and who was denied the necessary medical treatment. Aleksanyan was transferred from a pre-trial prison to an oncological hospital on 8 February 2008, after which Khodorkovsky called off his strike.

While Khodorkovsky was imprisoned, Arvo Pärt, the Estonian composer, wrote his latest symphony, Symphony no. 4, and dedicated it to Mikhail. The symphony was premiered on 10 January 2009 in Los Angeles at Walt Disney Concert Hall conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen.

In prison, Khodorkovsky announced that he would research for, and prepare, a PhD dissertation on the topic of Russian oil policy. The third part of Khodorkovsky's essay/thesis "Left Turn" with the subheading "Global Perestroika" was published in Vedomosti on 7 November 2008, in which he stated: "Barack Obama's victory in the US presidential elections is not simply the latest change of power in one individual country, albeit a superpower. We are standing on the threshold of a change in the paradigm of world development. The era whose foundations were laid by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher three decades ago is ending. Unconditionally including myself in that part of society that has liberal views, I see: ahead – is a Turn to the Left."

In May 2010, Khodorkovsky went on a three-day hunger-strike to protest what he said was a violation of the recent law against imprisonment of persons accused of financial crimes. The law was pushed by President Medvedev after the death of Sergei Magnitsky who died in pre-trial detention in a Moscow prison in 2008.