Thread by @MontyBoa99

@Billbrowder You may be wondering:
Why do we have the Magnitsky Act?
Why is Putin working so hard to fight its effects and undermine or repeal it?
Why is it so revolutionary in the fight for human rights and against corruption?
(thread)
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@Billbrowder The Magnitsky Act is a revolution in global human rights enforcement.
Bill Browder did more than just get justice for Putin's brutal treatment and murder of Sergei Magnitsky. He established the legal basis for targeting corruption as the root cause for human rights abuses.
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@Billbrowder Russia barred Browder from entering Russia to defend his company Hermitage Capital Management against false allegations of tax fraud. They seized the company, and persuaded new lawyers hired by the company to confess to the fraud.
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@Billbrowder After 15 such tax fraud cases, the Russian gov't had levied false charges of $1.5 billion against Bill Browder's Hermitage Capital Management.
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washingtonpost.com/news/politics/…

@Billbrowder The fraud by Putin's allies behind these false charges was discovered by Browder's anti-corruption forensic tax investigator, lawyer, and Ukrainian, Sergei Magnitsky.
During his investigation, Magnitsky was arrested and died in jail in Russia from his mistreatment.
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@Billbrowder Russia investigated Magnitsky's death, but acquitted the doctors in charge of Magnitsky's care.
When Magnitsky died, Bill Browder took on the work of fighting the corruption in Russia that had killed him.
He lobbied Congress, which passed the Magnitsky Act in 2012.
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@Billbrowder The Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act (2012) was designed to punish Russian officials believed responsible for the death of Sergei Magnitsky, by prohibiting their travel to the US, use of the U.S. banking system, and access to any of their assets in the U.S.
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@Billbrowder The 2012 Magnitsky Act passed the Senate 92-4.

Notable opponents were Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul.

Senator McCain accused Paul of "carrying out the desires.. of.. Putin", when he voted against a resol'n to admit Montenegro to NATO.
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cnn.com/2017/03/16/pol…

@Billbrowder In the first sanctions list in April, 2012, thirteen Russians were sanctioned by the Obama Administration. They were all believed to be connected with the fraudulent Hermitage tax case or the mistreatment of Sergei Magnitsky.
A year later, another 12 were added.
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@Billbrowder While you may have heard of the preceding, you may be unfamiliar with much of the rest of this thread.

Three years later, Congress enacted the *new* Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (2016).

The new Act amplifies the original 2012 Act's powers in major areas.
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@Billbrowder The 2016 Magnitsky Act authorizes sanctioning any individual (or organization) for human rights violations, or acts of significant corruption, anywhere in the world.

This overcomes the stumbling blocks of earlier int'l human rights law in 5 major ways.
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@Billbrowder How the 2016 Magnitsky Act transforms human rights law (1 of 5):

It addresses human rights crimes against *other countries' citizens*.

Prior int'l human rights laws *only* applied to a state's *own* citizens. States had no jurisdiction over crimes vs non-citizens.
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@Billbrowder How the 2016 Magnitsky Act transforms human rights law (2 of 5):

It targets individuals, rather than entire country.

Corrupt actors could shelter behind the sovereignty of their country, even when the country was sanctioned. Dictators live large, while citizens suffer.
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@Billbrowder How the 2016 Magnitsky Act transforms human rights law (3 of 5):

It doesn't rely on a U.N. treaty.

This unilateral approach avoids the problematic vetoes of the UN Security Council, and the UN's weak enforcement capabilities (apart from military intervention).
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@Billbrowder How the 2016 Magnitsky Act transforms human rights law (4 of 5):

It doesn't require a legal link between sanctioned individuals and a violation of human rights.

Corruption *per se* is sufficient; evidence of relation to a human rights violation is unnecessary.
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@Billbrowder How the 2016 Magnitsky Act transforms human rights law (5 of 5):

It allows and even *encourages* the submission of credible reports of human rights violations from NGO's.

Human rights & corruption watchdogs now have an easier, though limited, path to justice and deterrence.
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@Billbrowder Just since January of 2017, the U.S. Treasury Dept has applied the Magnitsky Act to sanction over 460 individuals or entities engaged in activities related tohuman rights abuses and/or corruption.
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@Billbrowder Countries with persons or entities sanctioned via the 2016 Magnitsky Act:

🇷🇺Russia
🇰🇵North Korea
🇮🇷Iran
🇸🇾Syria
🇲🇲Burma
🇸🇸South Sudan
🇨🇩Democractic Republic of the Congo
🇻🇪Venezuela
🇰🇭Cambodia
🇩🇴Dominican Republic
🇳🇱Netherlands
(and others)

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@Billbrowder The 2016 Magnitsky Act can defend the citizens of *any* country and punish *corruption* by individuals. It is both borderless and personal in its reach.

This is why Putin has been lobbying, litigating and even subverting U.S. politicians to try to eliminate or neutralize it.
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@Billbrowder Bill Browder deserves credit for helping to curb corruption and human rights abuses around the world.

He pressed the Obama Admin and U.S. Congress to lay the foundation for law enforcement powers that overcome the traditional barricades erected by dictators and kleptocrats.
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@Billbrowder For more, on the repercussions of the Magnitsky Act, see:

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https://twitter.com/MontyBoa99/status/1023978637975068672

@Billbrowder For sources used on this thread, see:
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https://twitter.com/MontyBoa99/status/1023981689805201408