By Lucy Komisar
May 6, 2018 –

I just saw Mikhail Khodorkovsky‘s Wall Street Journal April 23, 2018 article  How to Stop Vladimir Putin‘s Mafia.  Among other things, he promotes the Magnitsky Act “to stop Putin‘s Mafia.”

But now see how golden boy MBK made a deal with William Browder and colleagues Kenneth Dart (Dart Cups) and Francis Baker (Andersen Group) to sell them the Russian titanium  firm  Avisma complete with a transfer-pricing investor & tax-cheating scam.

WSJ, no mention? Surely your reporters know of MBK‘s transfer-pricing schemes, Avisma and most prominently the Yukos corruption? And how he stole Yukos, Avisma and other major Russian companies through rigged auctions.  See this.  The Financial Times wrote about some of it. Though Thomas Catan, who exposed the Yukos story, told me he was then moved to another beat!

WSJ, this is like asking Al Capone to write an op ed about tax evasion. Who could know better!

Or is your theory that it takes a crook to catch a crook?

More likely the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Anybody who criticizes Putin is a good guy and gets his corrupt past expunged.

Did we ever have a really honest corporate press?

And, BTW, the so co-called progressive press also does not report the truth about Khodorkovsky or his soulmate William Browder.

Just saw this explanation of why WSJ runs anti-Russia articles. It’s their ideology! From an article by Nikolai Petro, professor of political science at the University of Rhode Island and an expert on Russia and Ukraine:

Early in 2018, the Wall Street Journal began to search for a new Moscow Bureau Chief. Their ad said they were looking for someone to describe “Putin‘s role as a champion of so-called illiberal democracy who has become a beacon for right-wing politicians across Europe and even in the U.S. His traditional conservatism of blood and religion resonates amid economic uncertainty.” The advertisement did not describe these as issues to be explored, but as dogmas to be affirmed.