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Alexander Kashin, a disabled man who on Tuesday started a hunger strike after failing for ten years to receive a monetary compensation from the former U.S. Consul General in Vladivostok, has refused to accept $100,000 payment from the US State Department and continues his ‘water-only’ protest.

Kashin, 32, who was partially paralyzed in a 1998 car accident involving the former U.S. Consul General in Vladivostok Douglas Kent, said the suggested sum “was not adequate to the damage”.

In a telephone interview on Thursday, Kashin said that he received a call from officials at the Consulate General of U.S. in Vladivostok who suggested that he stop the hunger strike.

According to the official statement of the US Consulate General, “US State Department has decided to provide a one-time $100,000 humanitarian payment to Mr. Kashin,” the consulate’s Public Affairs Officer Brigit Gersten reported on Thursday. “Receiving the humanitarian payment does not impose any obligations or restrictions on Mr. Kashin. We hope that this will help Mr. Kashin and his family to receive the necessary medical assistance,” she said.

Kashin has refused the offer saying that, “the full rehabilitation costs a great amount of money, and this sum has not been spun out of thin air.” He claims $10 million. “If the U.S. Department of State does not agree to our conditions we are prepared to hire independent experts to determine the amount of damage,” Kashin stressed.

Kashin received a severe neck injury which left him paralyzed from the chest down in October 1998, when the car in which he was a passenger collided with Kent’s Chevy sport utility vehicle. The police ruled that the diplomat was responsible for the collision but Russian authorities failed to prosecute him criminally because of his diplomatic immunity. Kent left Russia soon after the accident.

In August 2006, the case of Kashin versus Kent was officially closed, with a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals ruling that the diplomat may not be sued by Kashin due to Kent’s diplomatic immunity.

“We are doing our best, working on our client’s case 24 hours a day,” Kashin’s Philadelphia-based lawyer Larisa Tenberg revealed in a phone call on Thursday. ‘Unfortunately, we have not received any positive response to our claims. The former Consul General Douglas Kent remains unpunished,” Tenberg lamented.

Kashin, who drinks only water during his hunger strike, said he is starting to feel worse and experiencing stomach and blood pressure problems. “I will keep up the protest until I am paid the compensation,” he stressed.


See related stories at:
http://vn.vladnews.ru/issue607/Special_reports/Disabled_Russian_on_hungerstrike_against_US_authorities
http://vn.vladnews.ru/issue531/Crime_watch/Immunity_shelters_former_US_Consul_from_Russian_invalid