17:16, 29 августа 2017, Bishkek - 24.kg news agency , Darya PODOLSKAYA
In a process that lasts six years, Kyrgyzstan has upheld the sentence to four Latvian citizens — former employees of Manas Bank Evgeny Verbitsky, Anita Lase, Yuri Kachnov and the bank’s shareholder Valery Belokon. In holding of the Latvian businessman declare, that «thereby continuing to break the rights of the Latvian citizens».
According to them, the court extended the consideration of the appeal, postponing the meeting date seven times. However, the proceedings lasted only a few hours, during which all the lawyer’s requests and petitions for dismissing the composition of the court were rejected. Contrary to the requirements, none of the defense witnesses was questioned. Of the thousands of documents presented in the case files, only seven were verified by the court.
The verdict will be appealed in the higher court. The court’s decision is not recognized and is not enforced in , the European Union and other civilized countries, the surroundings of Valeri Belokon state.
His lawyers claim that the trial was politicized from the very beginning, and the criminal case was fabricated. In their opinion, this is due to the fact that international arbitration obliged to pay Valeriy Belokoniy $ 16.5 million as compensation for illegally taken away bank from him.
Inese Laizane, the head of the Latvian Seimas Commission for Human Rights and Public Affairs, described such unlawful absentia sentencing of Latvian citizens in as «a flagrant violation of human rights and a flagrant violation of the UN Convention on Human Rights, which looks like the worst of Stalin’s totalitarianism.»
Note, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Latvia is considering the question of including in the «black list» of the European Union the officials of involved in the Manas Bank case. This 24.kg news agency reported earlier.
After the April events of 2010, representatives of the new government actually took away the bank «Manas» belonging to Belokon. He repeatedly tried to negotiate with the new government of on the return of his investments. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Latvia supports the position of Belokon and several times reminded the government of of its international obligations.
The international arbitration confirmed that the government of illegally took away the bank belonging to the businessman from . Representatives of Valery Belokon note that the government of the continues to violate the bilateral agreement concluded in 2008 with — on the protection of investments.