AAAS Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights and Law Program

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AAAS Human Rights Action Network

FACTS OF THE CASE:

Russian Security Police (FSB) have for the eighth time charged Alexandr Nikitin, a Russian engineer working for the Norwegian ecological foundation Bellona, with high treason and divulging state secrets for co-authoring a Bellona report about radioactive contamination in Russia's Kola Peninsula. The indictment, which was handed down on 2 July 1999, is based on secret retroactive acts and legislation, the application of which is contrary to Articles 15 and 54 of the Russian Constitution. Nikitin's lawyers now have two months to prepare his defense. The case is expected to be brought to trial again in September or October 1999.

On 4 February 1999, the Russian Supreme Court ordered Alexandr Nikitin's case to be returned to the Russian Federal Security Services (FSB) for further investigation. Among the items investigated by the FSB was the monetary damage to Russia's national security brought about by the Bellona Report.

Nikitin, who has been under investigation since October 1995, faces the threat of long-term imprisonment, and his passport has been confiscated. He is not permitted to leave St. Petersburg. His wife and daughter obtained political asylum in Canada.

Nikitin was arrested on 6 February 1996 and held for ten months in an infamous former KGP prison as part of what has been referred to as a "Russian Federal Security Services (FSB) offensive against the environmental movement." The FSB claims that the report Nikitin helped write, regarding the poor condition of nuclear facilities on the Kola peninsula, forty-five kilometers from the Norwegian border, contains state secrets, but Nikitin and Bellona maintain that the report is based on publicly available information.

The arrest of Alexandr Nikitin is in violation of Article 42 of the Russian Constitution, which prohibits secrecy in matters that may constitute hazards towards the environment or the health of human beings. In addition, it is contrary to human rights provisions enumerated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which the Russian Federation is a state party. They include:

Under the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

• No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention, or exile (Article 9); and
• Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression . . . (Article 19).

Under the United Nations Covenant on Civil and Political Rights:

• Everyone has the right to liberty and security of the person. No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest or detention . . . (Article 9); and
• Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers . . . (Article 19).

(Information for this update was provided by the Bellona Foundation's Web site: . Other sources of information include the Moscow Human Rights Research Center, The Toronto Star, The St. Petersburg Times, and the American Chemical Society.

RECOMMENDED ACTION:

Please send telexes, telegrams, faxes, or airmail letters:

• requesting that Russian authorities drop the charges against Alexandr Nikitin immediately and unconditionally on the grounds that they stem solely from the legitimate scientific work that he was conducting for the Bellona Foundation;
• calling on the Russian authorities to provide a full and detailed explanation of the charges against Nikitin; and
• indicating that actions against environmental research can only make the environmental cleanup of Russia more difficult; and on letters to U.S. officials.

APPEAL AND INQUIRY MESSAGES SHOULD BE SENT TO:

Boris Yeltsin
President of the Russian Federation
Rossiyskaya Federatsiya
g. Moskva
Kreml
Presidentu Rossiyskoy Federatsii Yeltsinu B.N.
Russia
Email: president@gov.ru
Fax: 011 (7095) 206 5173


Sergei V. Stepashin
Chairman of Government
Krasnopresnenskaya naberezhnaya, 2, 103274
Moscow
Russia


The Honorable William Jefferson Clinton
President of the United States
President of the United States
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, D.C. 20006


The Honorable Albert Gore
Vice President of the United States
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, D.C. 20006

COPIES SENT TO:

President of the Russian Academy of Science
Russian Academy of Science
52, B. Tul'skaya, Moscow, 113191
Russia


Alexander Voloshin
Head of Presidential Administration
Kreml, 103132, Moscow
Russia


The Honorable Madeleine Albright
Secretary of State
Department of State
2201 C Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20006
Fax: 202-647-7120

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