#Greenpeace #Arctic30s #plight #highlights the #inhumanity of #Russias #jails The #environmental #activists are among more than 114,000 #people #held in #scandalousconditions in #Russian #remandprisons Greenpeace #ship #ArcticSunrise anchored outside #Murmansk. The Arctic 30 #protesters #face up to seven years in prison on #hooliganism #charges. Photograph: Reuters It is now a month since the 30 Greenpeace activists arrested for attempting to board the #Prirazlomnaya #oilplatform were transferred from police lock-ups to remand prisons in Murmansk region in the Arctic #circle. Now facing the lesser charge of hooliganism, they may be lucky and get off with a fine, but a custodial sentence, involving a spell of up to seven years in correctional colony, is still on the cards for some. In the latter case, the destination will be correctional colony No 22, tucked away in the forests of Mordovia in the cluster of penal institutions where Nadezhda Tolokonnikov, one of the imprisoned members of Pussy Riot, has been on hunger strike. But whatever the eventual outcome, it is unlikely that the torment of the five British arrestees will end soon. New charges, a request by investigators for an extension of remand and post-sentencing appeals could keep the activists in their prison cells for longer than the current two‑month limit. The remand prison or investigatory isolator (the Russian abbreviation is sizo) is one of the most hated institutions among Russian prisoners. Even though prisoners in sizos are innocent until proved guilty, punishment begins in the remand prison. Furthermore, few people can expect to leave the remand prison other than in a prison transport to a distant correctional colony. Olga (not her real name), whom I interviewed for a research project on the penal system shortly after her release from prison, described how prisoners are broken while on remand so that by the time they arrive at the correctional colonies where they are to serve their sentences, they are already done for: The prisoners have been already victimised, broken and therefore compliant with the regime they find there. The degrading and demeaning treatment of prisoners under investigation has a long history in Russia stretching back to the Stalin era. Its most public manifestation today is the practice of confining defendants behind bars for court appearances. As one prisoners grandmother said of her grandson: He was like a dog in a cage. Iain Rogers, Greenpeace activist, in a cage in court Iain Rogers, one of the Greenpeace activists, in a cage at a bail hearing in Murmansk. Photograph: Igor Podgorny/SWNS The Murmansk regional prison services website has made interesting reading of late. Alongside the usual diet of prison officers sports achievements, celebrations of anniversaries and news from individual colonies, there are updates on the detention of the Greenpeace activists and reports from press conferences. Though not the Ritz, the prisoners, it appears, have everything they need. So, when the Greenpeace activists complain of cold, poor food and obstacles to visits, as far as the average Russian is concerned they are manifesting behaviour typical of the spoilt westerner. The penal service has made a particular effort to reassure the public that the Greenpeace activists are being treated exactly the same as ordinary Russians on remand – for foreigners, no special conditions. There are two problems with these arguments. The first is that the Russian prison services idea of everything they need falls well below the standards of other jurisdictions. The foreign prisoners have each been allocated a metal bunk in a small cell occupied by four or five other prisoners, in which there is a washbasin, a cold-water tap, a tepid radiator, a toilet only partly concealed by a low partition, and a table and bench screwed to the floor next to the toilet. This is where they spend 23 hours of the day, where they eat, wash and defecate in close proximity to one another. One hour is allowed for exercise, which takes place in a small walled yard, enclosed from the sky by metal caging. The female Greenpeace activists, unlike their male counterparts, are being held in single cells less than 9 sq m. They live in conditions that have much in common with isolation cells for hardened criminals. Russia joined the Council of Europe in 1996, which committed it to bringing its prisons up to European standards; yet last year, the European Court of Human Rights concluded that conditions in sizos systematically subject prisoners to inhuman and degrading treatment. So, when the prison service in Murmansk reassures the public that the Greenpeace activists are being treated no differently from other prisoners, it is admitting their human rights are also being violated. Prisoners marching in yard at a penal colony in Mordovia in 2007. Prisoners at a Russian penal colony in Mordovia in 2007. Photograph: Maxim Marmur/AFP/Getty Images Secondly, it is inaccurate to suggest domestic and foreign prisoners are receiving equal treatment. As every prisoner in Russia knows, the most crucial factor in survival is the 30kg food and medicine parcel that prisoners are entitled to receive a month. Every day all over Russia people queue up at the small hatch in sizos to hand over a parcel for a relative inside. These parcels not only provide the recipient with food and vitamins to supplement the meagre and unchanging prison diet, but also medicines and essential sanitary products. These parcels can make the difference between illness and health, cleanliness and filth. When the Greenpeace activists asked for vegetarian meals, the response of the prison authorities was, to put it mildly, disingenuous: foreign prisoners are entitled – as are Russians – to receive food parcels, so they could meet their special dietary needs that way. Russians know to bring warm clothes, an electric coil to heat water for a cup of tea, newspapers for a prisoner to read and use as toilet paper, and so on. No doubt local Greenpeace supporters can get some parcels to the imprisoned activists, but there are other difficulties that are not so easy for foreign prisoners to overcome, such as not having the language or cultural knowledge needed to spot who can be trusted – also essential to survival. The demonstrators who over the last month have come out on to the streets to support the Greenpeace activists have focused the worlds attention on the absurdity of the piracy charge. But the plight of the Greenpeace activists also throws light on the scandalous conditions in which more than 114,000 people are held awaiting trial in the Russian Federations remand prisons. We will know that Russia has really turned its back on its problematic penal legacy when people also demonstrate on the street protesting about the conditions of its prisons. theguardian/environment/2013/oct/28/greenpeace-arctic-30-russia-jails
Posted on: Mon, 28 Oct 2013 16:44:24 +0000
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