It took the judges two months to prepare the verdict after the prosecutors and the defence addressed the court with their final statements in mid-February. Then, the state prosecutor Sergei Verbin asked the court to sentence Eduard Limonov to 14 years in prison. Upon hearing the prosecutor’s request, the 60-year-old writer said he was ''ready to die in prison''.
The prosecutor claimed that Eduard Limonov and his right-hand man Sergei Aksyonov had been plotting a series of terror attacks and planned an armed invasion of northern Kazakhstan, where they tried to recruit volunteers for carrying out a plan entitled ''A Second Russia''.
Furthermore, the prosecutor’s office insisted that both Aksyonov and Limonov were guilty of calls for the armed overthrow of the state regime. Both defendants were accused of publishing three NBP-Info leaflets, in which the party leaders allegedly called for an armed seizure of power, the forming of an armed group and the setting up of guerilla bases in Kazakhstan.
Verbin also said that practically all the witnesses in the case were members of the NBP willing to help their comrades, meaning many details of the NBP leaders’ biography were never mentioned in court.
Throughout the trial the defence lawyers of Limonov and Askyonov applied every effort to shift the blame for the illegal purchase of weapons on to the four other defendants. Furthermore, the lawyers are convinced that Limonov had never called for the overthrow of constitutional order in Russia.
As for Limonov himself, he, in particular, denied the allegation that he was the author of the article entitled ''The Theory of a Second Russia'' which the prosecutors insist, contains a plan to overthrow the established order. In truth, the article, according to Limonov, was written by another NBP member, Vladimir Linderman, who confirmed Limonov’s words in court.
Also, Limonov challenged the competency of the 250 witnesses questioned during the pre-trial investigation. In his opinion, most of them had been brainwashed by FSB officers.
In his final address to the court, Limonov compared himself to Nikolai Chernyshevsky (a 19th century revolutionary, writer and philosopher) and called the proceedings against him politically motivated. ''We are no criminals, but honest Russian patriots. I insist on a verdict of not guilty,'' he concluded.
Over 20 witnesses of the defence also claimed that Limonov was innocent of the charges brought against him. Among them were two NBP members, who have gained notoriety in their own right. Alexei Golubovich was brought to the Saratov court from a Moscow remand centre, where he is being held after an attack on a police officer during a rally in Moscow’s Triumfalnaya Square on September 15, 2002. Another trouble-maker, who backed Limonov, was 19-year-old Dmitry Nechayev, who gained notoriety for throwing tomatoes at NATO Secretary General George Robertson in November last year.
Limonov was arrested on April 7, 2001 in the South Siberian Republic of Altai and initially charged with the illegal acquisition of firearms. The operation to detain the radical writer was conducted by the Federal Security Service.
In an official statement released shortly afterwards the special services reported the detention of several members of the National Bolshevik Party in March 2001 as they attempted to purchase firearms, ammunition and explosives. Criminal proceedings were instigated against the group and a day later the investigators acquired evidence of Limonov’s implication in the deal. According to one of the detained NBP members, Limonov had personally ordered them to buy weapons.
The NBP leader was then transported to the high-security Lefortovo prison and charged with terrorism and the illegal acquisition and possession of firearms. In June 2002 he was moved to Saratov, where on July 8 the trial began. In addition to Limonov, five more of his comrades found themselves in the dock, including Sergei Aksyonov - the founder of NBP’s newspaper Limonka (which is Russian military slang for a fragmentation grenade, but also sounds like something ‘belonging to Limonov’). Four of them are charged with illegally acquiring arms, setting up an illegal armed unit and preparing terrorist acts. Limonov and Aksyonov are also charged with incitement to armed mutiny.
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