Much has changed in Russia’s oil industry. In the old days, when oil executives were sent to a penal colony, no one knew about it. These days, everyone knows, at least superficially.
Consider the case of former OAO Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky, sentenced to 8 years on a charge of tax evasion and now in a penal colony in frosty Siberia-a setting that brings back memories of the bad old days, from tsars to politburo commissars.
According to Lt. Col. Yuri Yakushevsky, deputy chief of the regional Federal Correctional Service’s information and analysis department, Khodorkovsky has been put in Unit 8 of the 13-unit penal colony located on the outskirts Krasnokamensk in the south of the Chita region near Russia’s border with China.
65 roubles, 44 kopeks
Khodorkovsky has a bed in his cell, along with other furniture, kitchen utensils, and a television. His daily food ration is the usual 35 roubles 91 kopecks, while the total cost of his “upkeep” is 65 roubles, 44 kopecks, including the cost of bedding “and so on,” said Yakushevsky.
At least we have assurances, contrary to unfounded rumors, that Khodorkovsky will not be sent to work in the uranium mines around the penal colony.
“Since 1967, when this colony was set up, none of the convicts worked in uranium mines,” Yakushevsky said, scotching mass media reports that Khodorkovsky was to be punished even more by exposure to radioactive material.
In fact, no one knows yet just what job Khodorkovsky will undertake during his stay.
“If Khodorkovsky files an application, a respective commission of the colony will review it, and he will be offered a job depending on his professional skills,” Yakushevsky said, explaining that possible jobs include being manager of a household, a work card clerk, or a librarian.
Kafka’s ghost
Khodorkovsky, however, appears to have better things to do with his time, according to his defense attorney, Natalya Terekhova, who said he plans to write a thesis on economics.
The ever-obliging Yakushevsky confirmed that Khodorkovsky had indeed brought in two suitcases of literature to be used in the work on his thesis and that he would have the right to write and defend the work.
In fact, said the press officer, “It will be the first instance of this kind in the Chita region and elsewhere in Russia.”
But conditions there can’t be too good: Khodorkovsky will have to send his paper, when ready, to a commission since the arrival of commission members at the prison “would hardly be possible.”
I’m somehow reminded of that famous line in Franz Kafka’s book, The Penal Colony: “The Traveler really wanted to keep quiet at this point, but he felt how the Condemned Man was gazing at him-he seemed to be asking whether he could approve of the process the Officer had described.”
Russia’s “new” penal system is enough to make old Kafka turn in his grave.✦
