Mikhail Khodorkovsky Statement

English-language translation of statement of September 27, 2007 by Mikhail Khodorkovsky: “Please inform all my lawyers that I am withdrawing the defence from participation in the court hearing about the extension of my custody. The reason for this refusal is the categorical conviction that it is pointless to rely on a judicial defence when the prosecutor’s office and the court flagrantly and directly ignore the demands of the law. In such circumstances, I consider the presence of defence lawyers to be harmful, since it legitimates such arbitrary disregard for the law. Each of our objections has already been presented at the previous hearings. Nothing has changed since then.”