Inside the hellhole penal colony the place Alexei Navalny was held
- Russian opposition chief Alexei Navalny died on the brutal FKU IK-3 penal colony, a Soviet-era arctic facility referred to as Polar Wolf
- The facility holds greater than 1,000 of Russia’s worst criminals, who’re cramped into soiled cells and steadily crushed or tortured with electrical shocks
- Other types of punishment embrace forcing prisoners to line up exterior in -25F circumstances for as much as 40 minutes – and dousing them with water in the event that they transfer
Alexei Navalny spent his ultimate days in a hellish penal colony contained in the arctic circle the place prisoners are tortured with beatings and electrical shocks.
The opposition chief died whereas serving a 19-year sentence on the FKU IK-3 facility, referred to as Polar Wolf, which homes greater than 1,000 of the Russia’s worst criminals – together with a handful of political prisoners who dared to problem the Putin regime.
Polar Wolf is a Soviet-era jail and thought of to be one of many hardest in Russia.
Aside from the brutal therapy of inmates inside, the penal colony is positioned within the Arctic, 1,200 miles north east of Moscow, the place temperatures plunge beneath -25F.
Navalny was transferred there in December from Penal Colony 6, which is 150 miles exterior Moscow. He mentioned that it took 20 days to achieve FKU IK-3.
A view of the doorway of the jail colony within the city of Kharp, within the Yamalo-Nenetsk area about 1,200 miles northeast of Moscow, Tuesday, January 23, 2024
Alexei Navalny (pictured) died on the brutal FKU IK-3 penal colony, a Soviet-era jail camp
A lady walks in the direction of the doorway of the IK-3 penal colony, the place Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny died whereas serving his jail time period. The jail is within the settlement of Kharp within the Yamal-Nenets Region
The penal colony is positioned contained in the arctic circle and temperatures within the area can plunge to -25F. Prisoners are pressured to face exterior for prolonged intervals of time as a torture technique
Former inmates have described how FKU IK-3 is designed to make prisoners really feel ‘fully hopeless’ and crush ‘any rebellious spirit’. The facility in Kharp, a part of Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service, can maintain as much as 1,085 folks.
Lawyers for Navalny not too long ago claimed that guards on the penal colony had tried to ‘destroy Navalny’s well being by all forces and means’.
Vadim Kobzev, a lawyer for Navalny, mentioned he had misplaced 7kg in weight and was ‘intentionally contaminated’ with an unknown acute viral respiratory illness whereas in a hell-hole punishment cell.
Navalny ‘was not given correct medicines’ and was as a substitute ‘handled with large doses of antibiotics which mustn’t have been used’, Kobzev mentioned.
‘These actions can’t be regarded in any other case than as an open technique to destroy Navalny’s well being by all forces and means,’ the lawyer mentioned.
Other types of punishment and torture are mentioned to incorporate lining up prisoners within the freezing outside then blasting them with a strong water cannon.
Prisoners’ rights activist Olga Romanova recounted one inmate’s declare that throughout the peak of winter, they had been pressured to line up exterior in ‘mild clothes’ for as much as 40 minutes.
They are ordered to not transfer and if a single particular person a lot as rubs their fingers collectively for heat, ‘the entire group was doused with water’.
‘In the spring, there was a brand new torture. Mosquitoes and biting flies. If you moved a hand, the water got here. They would simply douse the entire group with a water cannon,’ Romanova mentioned, in keeping with Radio Free Europe.
About 60 km (40 miles) north of the Arctic Circle, Polar Wolf was based within the Sixties as a part of what was as soon as the Gulag system of pressured Soviet labor camps, in keeping with the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper.
A gaggle of officers go to the jail colony within the city of Kharp the place the temperature is because of drop to minus 28C over the subsequent week
A gaggle of officers stroll inside a jail colony within the city of Kharp, within the Yamalo-Nenetsk area about 1,900 kilometers (1,200 miles) northeast of Moscow
Harsh guidelines relationship again to Soviet instances dictate that prisoners’ households and attorneys are solely knowledgeable about their whereabouts after they’ve reached their vacation spot
A gaggle of prisoners sit throughout lessons contained in the jail colony the place associates of Alexei Navalny say he has been positioned
Little has been reported in regards to the basic dwelling preparations for prisoners who will not be held in solitary confinement. Conditions in different services counsel they sleep in cramped rooms full of cot beds.
It’s additionally unlikely that prisoners are given clothes which is substantial sufficient to take care of the freezing temperatures.
In January, Navalny cracked jokes on the Telegram messaging app in regards to the polar circumstances as he quipped sarcastically: ‘Nothing fairly invigorates you want a stroll in Yamal at 6:30 within the morning.’
‘Even at this temperature, you possibly can stroll for greater than half an hour provided that you handle to develop a brand new nostril, new ears and new fingers,’ he wrote of the -25F circumstances.
Navalny talked about a scene within the 2015 movie, The Revenant, by which Leonardo DiCaprio shelters within the carcass of a horse.
‘I do not suppose that might have labored right here. A lifeless horse would freeze in quarter-hour,’ Navalny mentioned. ‘We want an elephant right here, a scorching elephant, a fried one.’
The darkish jokes had been typical of Navalny’s refusal to interrupt within the face of unimaginable adversity. He as soon as described one of many colonies he was held in as like ‘a pleasant focus camp’.
The punishment cells the place inmates are held in solitary confinement are mentioned to be tiny – with solely a gap within the floor for a bathroom.
And the concrete-walled strolling yards utilized by prisoners are about 11 steps lengthy, three steps extensive and topped with metallic bars.
Former inmates at related services have additionally recounted how electrical shocks and beatings are steadily doled out by guards.
Ukrainian filmmaker Oleh Sentsov, who was jailed on the IK-8 ‘Polar Bear’ jail for 5 years, mentioned: ‘As quickly as you cross the edge, they let you already know that you’re in purgatory the place you don’t have any rights and there’s no one to complain to.
Navalny, pictured along with his spouse Yulia in happier instances, crusaded towards official corruption and staged large anti-Kremlin protests – drawing the ire of the Kremlin
‘Beatings, humiliation, electrical shocks, being saved in a chilly cell bare or in moist garments — however that’s nonetheless not the worst…. You might be sealed within the fetal place in an iron field the place you possibly can hardly breathe and must urinate on your self…. They routinely threaten to rape you when they’re bullying you.’
At Penal Colony No 6, the place Navalny was beforehand held, rape and violence involving inmates are commonplace, whereas the guards had been remorseless of their sadism.
While Navalny was held there, authorities punished him for tiny infractions.
He was as soon as punished for laundry his fingers six minutes sooner than scheduled and, on one other event, for undoing the highest button of his shirt.
Since first being jailed in January 2021, Navalny had been out and in of solitary confinement, which is usually used to punish rulebreakers within the Russian jail system, at each Penal Colony No 6 and the Polar Wolf facility.
Following his most up-to-date court docket look on Thursday – hours earlier than his loss of life – a submit by Navalny’s X account mentioned he was once more ordered into solitary confinement.
Jailed Russian opposition chief Alexei Navalny is lifeless, the jail service of the Yamalo-Nenets area the place he had been serving his sentence mentioned on Friday
Russian information retailers introduced Navalny’s loss of life – citing the Siberian jail service the place he was serving his sentence – sparking shock and anger across the globe, with world leaders rapidly pointing the finger at Russian president Vladimir Putin (pictured in Russia at present)
The on-line information outlet SOTA reported that the court docket session on Thursday was convened after an ‘argument’ with a jail officer who tried to confiscate Navalny’s pen.
Navalny wrote in a while Thursday that he had been given 15 days in solitary confinement.
‘The Yamal jail determined to interrupt Vladimir’s file of fawning and pleasing the Moscow authorities. They simply gave me 15 days in solitary confinement,’ he wrote on X.
‘This is the fourth solitary confinement spell in lower than 2 months that I’ve been with them,’ he added.
On one of many final events he was seen earlier in 2023, Navalny had simply emerged from his eleventh separate interval of incarceration in a 10ft by 7ft ‘concrete kennel’, with solely a gap within the floor for a bathroom.
He seemed much more gaunt and unwell than normal and was affected by a extreme lung an infection contracted after jail officers pressured him to share a cell with a tramp affected by a contagious respiratory situation — after which refused to deal with him when he acquired sick.
