Death of a Dissident - Alex Goldfarb [67]
As for URPO, Putin did disband it on a direct order from the Kremlin. However, Khokholkov was transferred to a sinecure position at the tax service. Kamyshnikov was transferred to the ATC. All former URPO opers were reassigned—except the five whistle-blowers. Everyone at the Agency said that their days were numbered.
On September 30, the prosecutors suddenly closed the URPO case without taking any action. During his final visit to the prosecutors’ office, Sasha spotted Trepashkin, whom he recognized from the photograph in his file.
“Hey, Misha, I am your would-be killer,” he introduced himself.
“And I am your would-be victim. Nice to meet you.”
A week later Boris received an official letter.
The investigation focused on two episodes, it said. First, it was confirmed that “on December 27, 1997, [Capt.] A. P. Kamyshnikov, in the presence of Litvinenko, Shebalin, Ponkin and Latyshenok, allowed himself a number of thoughtless statements in reference to you. However, these statements, while discrediting him [Kamyshnikov] as a team leader, did not constitute an intent to commit murder.”
Second, the investigators found that, in a separate conversation with Colonel Gusak in November 1997, General “Khokholkov asked whether he [Gusak] would kill you.” However, the letter said that “the conversation took place in the absence of other witnesses.” Moreover, “when Khokholkov asked him whether he would ‘bump’ you, [it was] in the context of a subject matter not directly related to you, hence he [Gusak] did not take it as an explicit order to commit murder.”
The two other alleged victims, Trepashkin and Dzhabrailov, received similar letters.
This was something that Boris expected. By then he already knew that Prosecutor General Skuratov was secretly cooperating with Primakov in developing several highly political probes that would target the Kremlin inner circle. The URPO investigation was a Kremlin-instigated case. It was not surprising that Skuratov quashed it.
When in mid-October the whistle-blowers met with Boris at The Club to consider their options, Sasha was adamant: they must not give up. This was a cover-up, he said. All the facts had been confirmed. The talk of “bumping” Boris was illegal, whether or not justice would be done. They should go ahead and make the whole thing public. The noose around them was tightening; publicity was their only remaining defense.
Trepashkin, who joined them, backed Sasha. Shebalin, as usual, was silent. Ponkin, Scheglov, and Latyshenok leaned toward Sasha’s position. As for Gusak, he had stopped talking to them several weeks ago. He knew which way the wind was blowing.
Boris’s first impulse was to talk to Putin, but he thought better of it. At that junction Putin was still an enigma. After his appointment to the FSB, he hid like a hermit crab in his shell. Perhaps it was time to force his hand. If he was committed to reforming the FSB, make him show as much. Boris took a week to think about the best options. By the end of October, he agreed: they should go public.
On November 13, the newspapers published an open letter from Boris to Putin, urging him to pursue the URPO affair. He wrote that the whistle-blowers, after revealing their information to him, had been accused by their superiors of “preventing patriots from killing a Jew who had robbed half of Russia.” This charge resounded with the recent scandal about General Makashev’s anti-Semitic diatribes.
Four days later Sasha and his friends staged a press conference. Sasha and Trepashkin dressed normally; the other four wore ski masks to hide their faces. The event was a sensation, but not in the way they had hoped. The press focused on only one charge among