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Mikhail Trepashkin

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Mikhail Ivanovich Trepashkin, (Template:Lang-ru) (7 April 1957 – ) is a Moscow attorney and former FSB colonel who was invited by MP Sergei Kovalev to assist in an independent inquiry of the Russian apartment bombings in September 1999 – the atrocities that followed Dagestan war and were one of the triggers for the Second Chechen War.

His career in FSB

Trepashkin started working in KGB in 1984 as an investigator of underground trade in stolen art. At the beginning of 1990s Trepashkin moved to Internal Affairs department of FSB where he worked for Nikolai Patrushev. He investigated connections of FSB officers with criminal groups. He won a medal for intercepting a plane-load of weapons sold by FSB officers to Chechen rebels After making public allegations of corruption in FSB in 1996, Trepshkin became a target on the FSB hit list according to statements by Aleksandr Litvinenko and several other FSB officers. On 17 November 1998 he appeared as a planned assassination victim at a press conference in the Russian news agency Interfax, together with Litvinenko and others who claimed about creation of a death squad in a secret FSB department called URPO (the Division of Operations against Criminal Organizations).

Investigation of Russian apartment bombings and imprisonment

Mikhail Trepashkin was invited by MP Sergei Kovalev to assist in an independent inquiry of the Russian apartment bombings. Two sisters whose mother was killed in one of the houses hired Trepashkin to represent them in the trial of two Russian Muslims accused of transporting explosives for the bombings.

While preparing for the trial Trepashkin claims he uncovered a trail of a mysterious suspect whose description had disappeared from the files. To his amazement, he claims, the man turned out to be one of his former FSB colleagues. He also claims to have found a witness who testified that evidence was doctored to lead the investigation away from incriminating the FSB. But Trepashkin never managed to air his findings in court. On October 22, 2003, just a week before the hearings, Trepashkin was arrested for illegal arms possession. He was convicted by a closed military court to four years for illegal arms possession and for "disclosing state secrets." An appeal court later overturned the arms possession charge, but the other sentence remained. In September 2005 after serving two years of his sentence, Trepashkin was released on parole, but two weeks later was re-arrested after the State appealed the parole decision .

The case of Mikhail Trepashkin caught the attention of the Western press , caused an uproar among human rights campaigners , was put on record by Amnesty International, mentioned by the US State Department and featured in an award-winning documentary Disbelief.. The documentary was funded by anti-Kremlin oligarch Boris Berezovsky.

Mikhail Trepashkin suffered from asthma with bronchial attacks on a daily basis, itching dermatosis and pain in the area of his heart, and he needed medical treatment. However, he was denied medical treatment, held in a freezing punishment cell, and transported with imprisoned tuberculosis patients who "were coughing right into your face because they were unable to either cover their mouths or turn away", according to Amnesty International

In November 30, 2007 Mikhail Trepashkin was freed with the expiration of his four-year prison term.

Involvement in Alexander Litvinenko affair

In a letter from prison Trepashkin alleged, that an FSB team had organised in 2002 to kill Alexander Litvinenko. He also claimed that FSB had plans to kill relatives of Litvinenko in Moscow in 2002, although these have not been carried out . He was going to visit Litvinenko in London on a request from the FSB, but he was denied entrance visa by the UK.

Trepashkin claims that supervisors and people from the FSB promised not to send him to the prison if only he leaves the Sergei Kovalev commission and start working with the FSB "against Litvinenko"

Family life

Trepashkin is married for the second time. He has two young children and a son from the first marriage.

Notes

  1. ^ Alex Goldfarb and Marina Litvinenko. "Death of a Dissident: The Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko and the Return of the KGB." Free Press, New York, 2007. ISBN 978-1416551652.
  2. http://eng.trepashkin.ru/court/81282.html
  3. http://www.prima-news.ru/news/news/2004/5/19/28486.html?print
  4. http://coranet.radicalparty.org/pressreview/print_right.php?func=detail&par=10113
  5. http://eng.trepashkin.ru/press/95348.html
  6. http://www.eng.terror99.ru/publications/#trepashkin]
  7. http://eng.terror99.ru/publications/151.htm
  8. Human Rights First - call for action
  9. International Commission of Jurists - Trepashkin statement
  10. Text of D.C. Bar International Law Section letter
  11. Amnesty International appeal
  12. http://eng.trepashkin.ru/reaction/80577.html
  13. http://www.disbelief-film.com/
  14. http://eng.terror99.ru/publications/149.htm
  15. http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGEUR460142006?open&of=ENG-385
  16. http://www.lenta.ru/news/2007/11/30/free/
  17. Template:Ru icon"М. Трепашкин: «Создана очень серьезная группа»". Chechen Press State News Agency. 1 December, 2006. Retrieved 2006-12-01. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  18. Template:Ru icon"Березовский и УРПО / дело Литвиненко". "Агентура.Ру". November 27, 2006. Retrieved 2006-11-30. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  19. Interview with Mikhail Trepashkin, RFE/RL, December 1, 2007. Russian: "давай вместе работать против Литвиненко и уйди из комиссии по взрывам домов и тогда тебя никто не тронет. Я говорил со своими шефами, совершенно точно, тебя не тронут. Кончай с Ковалевым Сергеем Адамовичем контактировать в Госдуме и так далее."

See also

External links

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