It turned out that my lawyer knew all about it, because he often dealt with prisoners from such cells. I felt that I was probably in a relatively “privileged” cell and we could suppose that I was lucky.
My lawyer told me about what was going on in the world “at large.” My arrest had created a storm of protest in our country and abroad. Gale Colby and Irene Goldman had called a few times to tell what measures different people had taken in the U.S. to try to help secure my release. Asnis had brought along two issues of the newspaper Izvestia with articles about my case. He had also called my wife to learn that everything was fine and the children were healthy.
The next court session was scheduled for February 4, 1994. Asnis asked if he should petition the judges to release me from prison, but I replied that I wasn’t going to ask anybody about it, especially not the judge who was an inveterate hypocrite.
Our meeting finished with that, and we said good-bye to each other until the next court session. The guard took me back to my cell by a different route. Jailers had their own original, though naive, tactics.
I arrived and told my cellmates about our meeting. Soon porridge and bread were brought and we started our dinner. On the NTV channel, Tatiana Mitkova reported that Vil Mirzayanov had finally been found in Matrosskaya Tishina Prison, in a cell with criminals and murderers. I was horrified. I had told my lawyer about my first night in the cramped holding cell with such people. Evidently my story had evolved a bit, before it reached the NTV anchorwoman.
My cellmates were not offended and didn’t demand any explanations from me, though they certainly guessed that I was the source of the information in this report. I was ashamed and told my cellmates that I was very sorry about Mitkova’s words. They began to comfort me, and said that surely I would be transferred the next day to the other half of Matrosskaya Tishina, where they kept the “political prisoners.”
The next day was Sunday and it would have been naive to hope that anyone would arrange for my transfer. That proved to be the case. Meanwhile, nothing had changed in our typical prisoners’ life: we spent long hours lying around on the bed, in deep and endless speculation, interrupted by sad outpourings of the heart.
I was fortunate that the press responded with significant and unrelenting pressure after my arrest. The wire services Reuters, Agencé France Presse (AFP), Associated Press, and others published reports about my arrest on January 27th. They stressed that the underpinnings of my case were political, which provoked a wide protest in the public and scientific circles of different countries. The U.S. administration reacted immediately. While answering a correspondent’s question at a press conference in the Russian-American Center on January 28, 1994, Thomas Pickering, the U.S. Ambassador in Moscow, summed up the official American position:
“With respect to Vil Mirzayanov, it’s a case in which we have taken a great deal of interest and in which we continue to be interested and which I have discussed a number of times with senior officials of the Russian Federation government… We will continue to follow this case with a great deal of interest…”[305]
The New York Times gave a brief history of my case on January 28, 1994 and the arrest that followed.[306]
On January 29, 1994 Izvestia published two articles[307], [308] about my case: an editorial and an article about the conditions I was treated to in prison. The editorial piece was an attempt to evaluate my case from the point of view of the general socio-political developments in Russia. It stressed that everyone had long understood that the case was absolutely groundless. The judges must have understood the whole absurdity of their actions and of “the Mirzayanov case” as such.
Then the newspaper analyzed possible reasons for why the case was continuing, and it came to the conclusion that a despotic regime and despotism in general were becoming established on the absurdity of the Mirzayanov case. Despite the alarms that the press was sounding, the authorities didn’t hear the warnings and continued with my “case,” throwing out a challenge to the whole society. So the press would have to find out who was behind all this. However, the newspaper doubted that any such person could be found. Izvestia further wrote,307 that
“…the motherland put the scientist on an equal basis with a murderer. Thus, before the next session of the Moscow City Court, scheduled for February 3, Vil Mirzayanov could be fully morally crushed and humiliated by his time in jail. Aleksander Asnis just wants to have a positive effect on the mental state of his client, and so he regularly meets with him in the investigation isolator cell. However, according to the defense attorney, it is not easy to get a meeting with a prisoner because Matrosskaya Tishina is probably the only single place left in Moscow where there is still a line – a line many hours long for lawyers who want to meet with their clients…”
Another article by Sergei Mostovshchikov308 on February 1st precisely reflects the impressions of my lawyer came away with from our meeting:
“Aleksander Asnis met his client and told him that on February 3, at the next session of the Moscow City Court he would raise the question about changing the unnecessary interruption. But, the court could agree to that only if Vil Mirzayanov promises to attend the proceedings. However, the chemist responded that he couldn’t voluntarily participate in a closed trial process that is violating the Constitution of his country. In the first place, the scientist doesn’t consider himself to be guilty, and secondly, he is certain that he cannot be convicted based on secret documents, because that is prohibited by Russia’s Primary Law. This is why he prefers to stay in jail and appear in the courtroom only if taken there by force.”[309]
My meeting with Asnis probably didn’t put him in a cheerful mood. He had to brief foreign journalists about my sad predicament. An article by Carey Scott, in the February 1, 1994 issue of The Moscow Times, discusses this.[310] The journalist reported that, according to the human rights activist Andrei Mironov, I was being kept under cruel conditions deliberately, especially to humiliate me. Scott also quoted a statement made by “Russia’s Choice” at a press conference which took place on Monday, January 31, regarding my case. The statement read that the party “hoped the Moscow court will finish hearing the Mirzayanov case in the shortest time possible in strict accordance with the Constitution and the law.”
Then Scott remarked that Nikolai Vorontsov,[311] a spokesman for “Russia’s Choice” who read the statement, said that I was charged based on a law that “didn’t exist before and does not exist now.” The article also noted that the human rights organization Helsinki Watch had published a statement, which said my case qualified as “fundamentally unjust” and stated that the case itself was violating “not only the Constitution of Russia, but also basic human rights.” Many western papers informed the public about my arrest.[312], [313]-315
One opinion which probably reflected the sentiments of a large part of the American public was expressed more eloquently in an editorial of The Wall Street Journal Europe and an article by J. Michael Waller there.[314], [315] He writes:
305
Excerpt with remarks by US Ambassador Thomas Pickering, from the transcript of the press conference held on January 28, 1994 in the Russian-American Press Center. Formally cited: Extract from the Congressional Record – Senate. (February 1, 1994. S.S.543-544).
306
“Russian in Chemical Arms Exposé Arrested”,
307
“Editoriaclass="underline" The Mirzayanov Case: Folly of the Authorities or the Establishment of Despotic Power”,
308
Sergei Mostovshchikov, “The Authorities put Scientist Vil Mirzayanov into One Cell with Criminals”,
309
Sergei Mostovshchikov, “Vil Mirzayanov is Sitting in a Cell with Seven Criminals and Four Mattresses”,
310
Carey Scott, “Activists Protest Jailing of Chemist”,
311
He was the former First Minister of Ecology of the USSR, a renowned scientist-biologist and academician.
312
“Russian Chemist Jailed after Refusing to Attend Trial”,
313
Judith Perera, “Russian Whistleblower Lands in Jail”,
314
“Review & Outlook: Russia on Trial”, (Editorial)
315
J. Michael Waller, “Soviet Redux: Secret Weapons and Poisoned Justice”,