Anatoly Chubais And Corruption

EDM number 488 in 1997-98, proposed by Ken Livingstone on 20/11/1997.

That this House is disturbed by recent admissions by the Russian Government of high-level corruption in relation to its privatisation programme, involving first deputy prime minister Anatoly Chubais, who admitted that he, and other Russian officials, received $90,000 each from a publishing house controlled by Oneximbank, which was the victor in various recent Russian government privatisations; notes that the claim that such payments were advances for a book on privatisation is refuted by the fact that President Yeltsin has already dismissed the privatisation minister, the head of the state bankruptcy commission, and the second ranking member of the presidential administration for receiving these payments, while Mr Chubais, however, retains the post of first deputy prime minister; is concerned that this scandal follows the dismissal earlier this year of the former head of privatisation, Mr Kokh, because of the irregularities in the privatisation of the Russian telecommunications company, and that it was subsequently revealed that Mr Kokh had received $100,000 from a Swiss company headed by a family member of the US financier Boris Jordan, who was a successful participant in the victorious consortium in that privatisation; and urges Government ministers, who recently met Mr Chubais and other Russian ministers to make clear at future meetings with relevant members of the Russian Government that such corrupt practices are regarded as completely unacceptable to Her Majesty's Government.

This motion has been signed by a total of 15 MPs.