Israel
Indicts Avigdor Eskin With Illegal Spying on Michael Cherney,
Alleging Crime By Oleg Deripaska
By
Herb Brandon
Israel News Agency
Tel
Aviv, Israel ---- January 7, 2011 ...... The
Israel Attorney General's office has submitted an indictment of
Avigdor Eskin, a political activist, to a Jerusalem court. The
indictment relates to the case of illegal collection of information
about Israel businessman and philanthropist Michael Cherney.
Eskin is the fourth defendant in this wire tapping case, which
focuses on illegal spying on Michael Cherney (Michal Chernoy).
As reported by the IzRus News Website, in the last few months
the Israel Attorney General's office negotiated with Eskin about
bringing up lesser chargers of dropping them altogether in exchange
for his confession that the illegal wiretapping of Cherney was
ordered by Russia billionaire Oleg Deripaska.
One year ago, a Tel Aviv, Israel court found the former private
investigator guilty in the same case and sentenced him to 14 months
of prison and damages amounting to 20,000 shekels. In September
2010 charges were also brought against former private investigators
Rafael Pridan and Maksim Gurevich.
According to the bill of indictment submitted to the Jerusalem,
Israel court this month, one of the charges against Eskin is that
in April 2007 was contacted by Alexei Drobaschenko whose objective
was to inflict damage on businessman Michael Cherney. At that
time Drobaschenko was serving as the head of external relations
for Basic Element, the financial and industrial group that manages
Oleg Deripaska's assets. The indictment details that at a meeting
in Moscow, Drobaschenko explained to Eskin and Pridan that "people
he represented are in conflict with businessman Michael Cherney
and wanted to gather information on him".
This Jerusalem criminal case is directly related to a lawsuit
taking place in London. In November 2006 Michael Cherney filed
a law suit against Oleg Deripaska, his former business partner.
In this case Cherney demands that he be recognized as the owner
of 20 per cent of the stock in UC Rusal (the second largest aluminum
producer in the world), or else that he be compensated the full
value of the package.
The
total of the claim by Michael Cherney, including various interest
and charges by June 2010, exceeds $4 billion USD.
The
High Court in London has ruled against all of Deripaska legal
motions that challenged British jurisdiction for the case and
the court will hear the case on its merit in April 2012.
In April 2009 Israel publication Haaretz noted that this London,
England suit was the cause of Deripaska and his advisers undertaking
large scale attempts to discredit Cherney in Europe and Israel.
In addition to attempting to damage Cherney's reputation, they
allegedly expected that a European country would place him on
the international Wanted list in order to prevent him appearing
in court in London.
On February 14, 2008, Cherney filed a suit in a Tel Aviv court
against nine people, including Oleg Deripaska, Alexei Drobashenko,
Avigdor Eskin, Rafael Pridan and Aviv Mor, asking for 10 million
shekels in damages. Cherney claimed that Deripaska had launched
an international campaign , including one in Israel, to discredit
him. This included "slanderous publications in electronic
and print media, street graffiti, and attempts to influence authorities
by illegal means".
On
May 13, 2010 the Swiss Court awarded Michael Cherney a compensation
of 30,000 Swiss francs for unfounded suspicions of his links to
the "Russian Mafia". The Swiss court ruled that Michael
Cherney be financially compensated for moral damages to him and
his family caused by the investigation which dragged from 1996
till 2007. After the Swiss court's 2008 ruling that Cherney was
not linked to organized crime, he decided to sue for moral damages.
Experts expect that the next indictment will be against Alexei
Drobashenko, the former head of external relations for Basic Element
(BasEl), and that this will directly implicate Oleg Deripaska,
the owner of BasEl, in this criminal case.
Michael
Cherney spends much of his time as a philanthropist - serving
as the director of the Michael
Cherney Foundation.
The Michael
Cherney Charity Foundation was created on June 1, 2001, on the
night of the Islamic terror bombing at the Dolphinarium Disco
in Tel Aviv. When Michael Cherney learned the number of victims
- twenty one dead and over 150 wounded, he realized that rendering
assistance required a systematic organized effort. This was the
genesis of the Foundation.
Prior to 2001,
Cherney was engaged in charity work in Russia, Ukraine, Central
Asia, Bulgaria, the US - wherever he did business. He made especially
valuable contribution into Jewish philanthropy in Russia.
The Cherney
Fund renders help mostly to the new arrivals, victims of catastrophes
and terrorist acts that continue to attack Israel, as well as
to the low-income victims of terror in other countries.
Another equally
important task assumed by the Cherney Foundation is the media
effort in war on terror. Shortly after the Dolphinarium attack,
the Foundation published a book called Dolphinarium: Terror
Targets the Young. The book is an oral history, a representation
of the voices of the parents who lost their children and the teenager
victims themselves. It was published in three languages and met
with acclaim in Israel, the United States, and Russia.
The Fund's
contribution into conveying the truth about the war of terror
against the Jewish people has met with high appreciation from
the media, public organizations, and the Israeli government.
The Fund also
actively participates in various children and youth-oriented programs,
in human rights, public relations for Israel, projects that counter
anti-semitism and various athletic programs. Last year, Michael
Cherney contributed logistical support to the Israel Defense Forces
(IDF), the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Israel Flying
Aid when they established an emergency search and rescue unit
and medical field hospital in Haiti following a devastating earthquake.
Michael Cherney
is also the director of The
Jerusalem Summit, an Israel based advocacy organization that
brings together Evangelicals, neoconservatives, and pro Israel
leaders from across the globe in an effort to shape the debate
over the status of Palestine, radical Islam, Islamic Apartheid
and what its members view as the "relativism" of the
West.
Internet
Marketing SEO Professionals ask:
Can People
Find Your Website?
ISRAEL
NEWS AGENCY
Sponsored
by IsraelSEOPr.com
Hosted
by
© IsraelInternet News Agency IsraelNewsAgency.com
Israel Marketing News.com NewYorkSEOMarketing.com
LondonSEOPr IsraelPr.com Leyden Communications Group
All Rights Reserved. Non-Profit Site Copyright 1995, 2010
|