Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny appeared on Wednesday for the first time via video link from the penal colony to which he was recently transferred. The video link was put up in connection with a trial from the penal colony to which Navalny was recently transferred. He is thin and can be seen behind a grill in the IK-3 camp in Charp, a remote place north of the Arctic Circle.
Despite the very difficult circumstances for Navalny, he asked the judge joking and provocative questions. Navalny, who had been missing for a couple of weeks in connection with the transfer from Melekhovo prison before Christmas, asked the judge a pointed question.
The opposition leader wondered if the prison management had celebrated his transfer with karaoke and nude parties. It was a clear reference to the modestly dressed party that recently became a big scandal in Russia.
Celebrities and semi-celebrities made headlines, especially the man wearing only a sock over the holiest of holies. The partying led to the detention of the undressed partygoers Navalny was referring to in his joke.
“Actually, there is nothing to joke about”
Communicating with people outside prison through jokes and absurd exaggerations has become Navalny’s style. The penal colony IK-3 belongs to the highest security class in Russia and was built on the same site where part of the Gulag system’s prisons and labor camps were located.
Actually, there is nothing to joke about here. Not at all. Nevertheless, the opposition politician stated that there is “a fresh breeze blowing in the prison yard” and that it “has never been lower than minus 32 degrees”.
The Russian opposition leader has been sentenced to 19 years in prison for “extremism”. Amnesty International and other human rights organizations see him as a political prisoner.
The move to the rugged area of northern Russia is seen as a preparation for the presidential election in which Putin is the presumed winner at the end of March. In this way, the authorities want to avoid public gatherings or various types of expression of opinions near the prison when there are elections, according to assessments by human rights activists.
But despite the attempts to break down Navalny, we can probably be sure that he is doing his utmost to return with his sarcasm.
Facts: Alexei Navalny
From the beginning best known as an anti-corruption activist. But over time, Alexei Navalny (born 1976) emerged as the main opposition leader in Vladimir Putin’s Russia.
Has been arrested and convicted repeatedly and banned from standing in general elections.
In August 2020, Navalny became acutely ill during a flight from Tomsk in Siberia. After being treated for several months in a hospital in Germany, where it was established that he had been poisoned by the nerve agent Novichok, he returned to Russia on January 17, 2021.
He was immediately arrested at the airport and subsequently jailed for breaching bail, in what is widely seen as a politically-directed process.
Last year he was sentenced to nine years in prison after being convicted of embezzlement and contempt of court, and in August this year he was sentenced to a further 19 years in prison for extremism.
The sentences against Navalny are considered by both his supporters and the outside world to be politically motivated and the regime’s way of trying to silence criticism of the Kremlin. (TT)