Here’s my latest blog for Huffington Post UK:

With the wave of oligarchs that continue to flock to London to battle out their grievances, sadly embezzlement scandals and corruption are associations we regularly make with Russia nowadays.

As Russia’s recent accession to the WTO has brought corruption in the country under renewed scrutiny, a play showing at London’s New Diorama Theatre has also shed new light on the lesser-known aspects of the Russian judicial system.

One Hour and Eighteen Minutes, written by Elena Gremina and translated by Noah Birksted-Breen looks at the run-up to the death of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in a Moscow prison cell in 2009, having been arrested after he stumbled across a cover-up by state officials to embezzle an estimated $230m (£146m) from the Russian treasury.

The timing of the play couldn’t be more poignant since on Friday 16 November the US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly in favour of the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012, which will impose visa sanctions and asset freezes on 60 Russian officials implicated in Magnitksy’s death.

Published on 27 November 2012. Read on here