Top Russian Jew Arrested

Russian police have arrested a prominent member of a top Russian Jewish organization on kidnapping charges, prosecutors said Wednesday.

The arrest was politically charged because the man detained, Mikhail Mirilashvili, is a business associate of media mogul Vladimir Gusinsky, who has been charged with fraud in a dispute over control of Russia's largest private media company.

Gusinsky is president of the Russian Jewish Congress, one of the two main national Jewish organizations in Russia, while Mirilashvili is director of the St. Petersburg chapter. The Jewish Congress would not immediately comment on the arrest.

Agents of Russia's Federal Security Service detained Mirilashvili on Tuesday evening at his apartment in St. Petersburg, said prosecutor Ivan Sydoruk. He said Mirilashvili was charged with kidnapping two people, and said the arrest was not linked to any legal actions against Gusinsky.

Sydoruk would not identify the two victims, but said "the case may be related to the kidnapping of Mirilashvili's father last year." He declined to elaborate.

Mirilashvili owned casinos and other businesses in St. Petersburg, NTV television news reported.

He was also president of Russian Video, a St. Petersburg business affiliated with Gusinsky's media company and the target of a separate investigation by prosecutors, according to the Interfax news agency.

Gusinsky was briefly arrested last summer in a case alleging theft of state property at Russian Video. After his release, he left Russia.

Gusinsky has said that case and the current charges against him are politically motivated as retaliation for critical coverage of President Vladimir Putin in his media outlets. He is under house arrest in Spain fighting an extradition request from Russia.

He is now charged with fraud in receiving loan guarantees from Russian natural gas monopoly Gazprom in 1996.

By Thomas Rymer
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