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Court postpones hearing of attempted mutiny case

The decision was made in connection with the illness of two lawyers of the defendants

MOSCOW, January 30 (Itar-Tass) - The Moscow City Court on Wednesday postponed the arguments of the parties in the case against retired main intelligence department Colonel Vladimir Kvachkov, accused of attempted munity.

The decision was made in connection with the illness of two lawyers of the defendants.

The defense said the lawyer of Alexander Kiselyov "suffered a heart attack" and can only appear in court in two weeks. The prosecutor for the state had asked the court to go ahead with the trial, but a judge ruled that the hearing would be postponed.

At the same time, the court gave Kiselyov five days to sign a contract with another lawyer. In response to it, the retired Colonel said "he did not want a new lawyer."

"Your consent is not required for assigning a free lawyer to you; you can also sign a contract with another lawyer, but you may opt not to," presiding judge Pavel Milekhin said.

The trial of the criminal case against Vladimir Kvachkov is open; but the court met in camera to look into the materials marked "confidential."

Kvachkov and other defendant, Alexei Kiselyov, were charged with planning an armed mutiny and recruiting or involving persons in terrorist activity. Kiselyov was also accused of illegal keeping of weapons and explosives.

Kvachkov denied any wrongdoing and insisted that all the charges were far-fetched.

He said he had been arrested on the testimony of a regional leader of the Narodnoye Opolcheniye (Militia) organization he leads.

The chief of Narodnoye Opolcheniye's Togliatti office was apprehended in the summer of 2010.

After ten days in custody he testified against Kvachkov.

"According to the testimony, there was a person in Togliatti, who sent two groups of people, armed with crossbows, to a forest to begin an armed uprising," Kvachkov said.

He said he was confident that the detainees' statements were distorted, in order to show Narodnoye Opolcheniye and another organization - Minin and Pozharsky's Militia - as terrorist groups. "There are no facts to support the case," the retired Colonel said.

Kvachkov was the key suspect in the case over the assassination attempt on the life of chief of RAO UES electric utility Anatoly Chubais on March 17, 2005.

A jury found all the defendants in the assassination attempt case not guilty, in a marathon eight-hour session overnight to August 21, 2010. Kvachkov later won a 450,000-rouble damages suit.

Kvachkov had to undergo a psychiatric expert examination twice. The first was carried out within the Chubais attack probe.

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