MOSCOW — In a surprise decision, President Vladimir Putin announced Thursday that jailed former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky will be pardoned, a move that will see his top foe and Russia’s onetime richest man freed after more than a decade in prison.
The development, along with an amnesty for two jailed members of the Pussy Riot punk band and the 30-member crew of a Greenpeace protest ship, appeared aimed at easing international criticism of Russia’s human rights record ahead of the Winter Olympics in Sochi.
Putin waited until just after his tightly choreographed annual news conference to make the announcement.
Putin said the 50-year-old Khodorkovsky, who was set to be released next August, had submitted an appeal for pardon, something he had refused to do before.
“He has spent more than 10 years behind bars. It’s a tough punishment,” Putin said. “He’s citing humanitarian aspects. His mother is ill. A decree to pardon him will be signed shortly.”
Khodorkovsky’s son, Pavel, tweeted, “Very happy news. Waiting to speak with my father to learn more.”
Putin’s announcement “came as a big surprise for me, totally out of the blue,” said Khodorkovsky’s mother, Maria, to RT television.
Analysts viewed the decision as a clever step ahead of the Sochi Olympics.
“At first blush, the pardon for Khodorkovsky appears to be a rather canny move that will throw Putin’s critics off-balance in the run-up to Sochi, while sending a clear message of self-confidence to his domestic political opponents,” said Andrew Weiss of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in a written commentary.
In October 2003, masked commandos stormed into Khodorkovsky’s jet on the tarmac of a Siberian airport and arrested him at gunpoint. He was found guilty of tax evasion in 2005 and convicted of embezzlement in a second case in 2010.
At the time of his arrest, Khodorkovsky was estimated to have a fortune of about $15 billion, but it’s not clear what is left. Khodorkovsky’s oil company, Yukos, was once Russia’s largest but it was dismantled after his arrest, its most lucrative assets ending up in the hands of the state-owned company Rosneft.
Critics have dismissed the charges against Khodor- kovsky as a Kremlin vendetta for challenging Putin’s power. During Putin’s first term as president, the oil tycoon angered the Kremlin by funding opposition parties and also was thought to harbor personal political ambitions.
During the news conference, Putin was asked whether Khodorkovsky could face another criminal case that would keep him behind bars longer. He gave a vague answer, saying he doesn’t see grounds for that, but prosecutors must investigate alleged offenses.
