Sept. 23, 2008, Washington, D.C. – Today lawyers on the international defense team of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Russia’s most high profile political prisoner, point to a 2005 bi-partisan resolution supporting him signed by Senators John McCain, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden, urging the candidates to express their support of political prisoners in the upcoming presidential debates.

“In these days of vibrant partisan debate over the future of U.S. policy toward Russia, it’s important to identify areas of consensus, such as this past resolution,” said Robert Amsterdam, a member of the Khodorkovsky defense team. “The release of political prisoners is a test of President Dmitry Medvedev’s determination to address the problem of legal nihilism.”

The Senate resolution signed by McCain, Obama, and Biden, dated Nov. 18, 2005, states that “the trial, sentencing, and imprisonment of Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev have raised troubling questions about the impartiality and integrity of the judicial system in Russia,” and that their imprisonment represents “a violation of the norms and practices of Russian law.”

Khodorkovsky, who has now served five years in prison, recently had an important exclusive interview published in the French newspaper Le Figaro, where he commented that “Both my friends and my foes understand the enormous symbolic meaning of my case for the country, and its meaning for those who have fallen under the steamroller of Russian justice.”

The trial and imprisonment of Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been recognized as politically motivated and unlawful by outside observers, such as the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and the Swiss Federal Tribunal.

“The issue of judicial reform is one which both Russia and the United States see eye to eye, and would be a tremendous signal to international investors,” said Amsterdam. “No one should forget the sudden rise in the Russian markets when it was briefly thought that Khodorkovsky would be released on parole. Investor confidence, stability, and the enhancement of cooperative international relations are all impacted by the handling of this case.”

The full text of the McCain-Obama-Biden resolution, as well as the translation of the Le Figaro interview, are available at http://www.robertamsterdam.com.