BREAKING: Khodorkovsky lands at Schönefeld Airport in Berlin

Ex-oil tycoon and Russia’s once richest man Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been freed from jail after a decade of imprisonment after receiving a pardon from President Vladimir Putin.

rt.com...

14:40 GMT: Mikhail Khodorkovsky has landed in Berlin, German foreign office spokesman has said in a statement.

10:49 GMT: Mikhail Khodorkovsky lawyer Vadim Klyuvgant has announced that his client has left the prison in the Karelia Region town of Segezha, nearly 1,000 kilometers north of Moscow.

“We have just received official confirmation from the management of the prison that Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been released and has left the prison,” he said.

09:01 GMT: Russia’s President Putin signed a decree pardoning Mikhail Khodorkovsky. "Guided by humanitarian principles, I decree that Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky... should be pardoned and freed from any further punishment in the form of imprisonment. This decree comes into force from the day of its signing," the decree, published on the Kremlin website on Friday, read.

2012newstart

Ex-oil tycoon and Russia’s once richest man Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been freed from jail after a decade of imprisonment after receiving a pardon from President Vladimir Putin.

rt.com...

This is one of the first people to be freed in Putins amnesty last Wednesday.

The Greenpeace "Arctic 30" could be home by Christmas, and the two jailed members of the punk group Pussy Riot should be released from jail in the coming days, after a wide-ranging amnesty law was passed by the Russian parliamenton Wednesday .

The Pussy Riot pair are serving a two-year sentence for hooliganism motivated by religious hatred, while the Greenpeace activists are charged with hooliganism and are currently on bail awaiting trial in St Petersburg.

More can be read here : www.theguardian.com...

However, and with all due respect I am not to sure how good your English is as by looking at the pic on your avatar but i am having a guess that you are Russian?

It would be nice if your English is good enough to add some of your own words too? (If this is not the case then please accept my apologies.)

Kindest respects

Rodinus

5h and 40 minutes from the Northern Karelia prison camp to Berlin. Can you imagine?
It seems to me arranged in advance. He reportedly asked his documents to be prepared to go to Germany, where reportedly his mother underwent treatment. Later his mother said to be in Moscow and didn't hear him because he had no phone.

WHY NOW??? Any suggestions?

2012newstart
WHY NOW??? Any suggestions?

Could it just be a way of repainting (or camouflaging) his tarnished image of the past couple of years... who knows??

If i am correct, the next presidential elections in Russia are not until 2018?

There was this thread also posted today in which he has invited a whole bunch of press people for Q and As.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Maybe he has just decided to put his Santa hat on!

Kindest respects

Rodinus

reply to post by 2012newstart

To better the international view of Russia ahead of the Winter Olympics?

That's what most are speculating.....

The amnesty, to mark the anniversary of the adoption in 1993 of Russia's post-Communist constitution, will be applied to thousands of Russian prisoners, the state-run RIA Novosti news agency reported.

It comes at a time when Russia's human rights record is in the spotlight, as the country prepares to host the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi in February.

cnn.com

reply to post by OneisOne


I completely forgot about that!!!

Such a shame that he hasn't shown the conditions that many migrant workers are suffering on the Olympic sites!

On February 2014, the Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia--expected to be most expensive Games in history--will launch.

The Russian government has invested in state-of-the-art winter sports venues and infrastructure in this Black Sea resort and in the nearby Caucasus Mountains.

But the run-up to the Games has been marred by abuses against Sochi residents and migrant workers toiling on Olympic construction, and by the adoption of a discriminatory antigay law.

The IOC, National Olympic Committees and corporate sponsors should urge Russia to end these abuses which violate the principles of “human dignity” and non-discrimination enshrined in the Olympic Charter, and work to prevent similar abuses by future Olympic host cities.

More here :

www.hrw.org...

Kindest respects

Rodinus

I suggest Putin prepares (for) a major change of some kind. That's why he is doing those pardons now, and not a year ago. At least Khodorkovski case was on the table at 2012 elections, the others came later.
Is it because of the Olympics? I don't know.