Russia responded angrily on Thursday to a proposal that would deny European visas to a list of 60 officials who have been implicated in the death of Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer who died in pretrial detention in Moscow last year. Konstantin I. Kosachev, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the lower house of Parliament, condemned the proposed ban as 'Bolshevik tactics' and said Russia might be forced to 'very harshly retaliate' if the proposal went forward. He said such pressure 'could have extremely negative consequences for the entire relationship between Russia and the European Union.' Russia's Foreign Ministry called the move 'direct interference in the domestic affairs of a sovereign state, and open pressure on the judicial system of the Russian Federation.' The comments were in response to the European Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee, which voted to add the recommendation to its annual human rights report. The proposal remains far from becoming policy. First, it must be approved by the full European Parliament in December. Then it would be up to the EU's member states to decide whether to adopt sanctions against the 60 officials, said Heidi Hautala, a member of the Finnish delegation, who sponsored the proposal. 'What it represents is a strong concern in the European Union that it's time to give justice to Magnitsky, who certainly looks like a victim of the Russian judicial system,' she said. The 60 names include highly placed officials in the Russian Interior Ministry, prosecutorial investigative committee and prison administration, as well as 12 judges. The proposal recommends denying them visas and freezing assets and bank accounts held overseas. The committee's vote follows a recommendation by Sen. Benjamin Cardin, D-Md., in April that the State Department deny visas to the officials, a group now known in Russia as 'Cardin's List.' Magnitsky died on Nov. 16, 2009, after being held for more than 11 months on suspicion of tax fraud. At the time of his arrest, Magnitsky was working as outside counsel for Hermitage Capital Management, an international investment fund whose founder, William Browder, was involved in a bitter feud with the Russian authorities. Browder had accused Russian officials of using his companies to embezzle $230 million from the Russian Treasury. Last week, on the anniversary of Magnitsky's death, police officials announced that they had evidence Magnitsky was responsible for the theft. Though President Dmitry Medvedev ordered an investigation into Magnitsky's death, there has apparently been little progress toward a prosecution. Sergei Mironov, the speaker of the upper house of Parliament, warned that if European nations acted on the proposal, Russia might retaliate with similar measures. 'As a rule, such measures are mirrored, and Russia will have to do the same: If you bar our officials, we will apply the same instruments,' he said, according to the Interfax news agency. 'However, these measures are inappropriate, and there must be another way for our relations.' 