'Nation's fate to be decided by court verdict,' jailed oil tycoon claims

Published on Tuesday 2 November 2010 16:57

Imprisoned Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky gave an impassioned final address to a Moscow court yesterday, telling the judge that the fate of the entire nation rests on the verdict in his trial.

In his last words before proceedings were adjourned until 15 December, he also said he was ready to spend the rest of his life in prison, insisting that the principles he believed in were "worth my life".

Khodorkovsky, 47, was Russia's richest man and the owner of its largest and fastest-growing oil company when he was arrested in 2003 on charges of tax evasion. The eight-year sentence he received and the state's takeover of his Yukos oil company were widely seen as punishment for his decision to challenge the authority of the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin.

He is now a year from release but is being tried on a second set of politically-driven charges that could keep him behind bars until 2017.

"Here and now, the fate of every citizen of our country is being decided," Khodorkovsky told Judge Viktor Danilkin.

He asked the judge to think of people all over the country who "are not counting on becoming victims of police lawlessness, who have set up a business, built a house, achieved success and want to pass it on to their children, not to raiders in epaulettes".

Before his arrest, Khodorkovsky financed opposition parties, which gave him clout in parliament and the power to oppose Kremlin legislation.

He pursued his own energy policies independent of the Kremlin and at the time of his arrest was on the verge of selling part of Yukos to a major Western oil company.