UN experts say Navalny in 'serious danger' and call for his medical evacuation from Russia

The group of United Nations (UN) experts on April 21 raised concerns about the health of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny fearing that the Kremlin critic is in “serious danger” due to deteriorating health and severe conditions in prison. The four independent experts on the matters of freedom of expression, torture, extrajudicial executions and the right to physical and mental health, further called on the Russian government to allow Navalny to be “evacuated” so that he can get the required medical assistance. The UN experts emphasised that the Vladimir Putin-led government is “accountable” for the Kremlin critic’s life in detention.

“We believe Mr. Navalny’s life is in serious danger,” the UN independent human rights experts said in a statement.  

“He has been incarcerated under harsh conditions in a high-security penal colony and denied access to adequate medical care. Despite having recently been transferred to a hospital, doctors of his own choosing have not been allowed to visit him.” 

Alexei Navalny, who has been on hunger strike in the Russian penal colony, according to his team, has been under harsh conditions lacking adequate medical care and has even been prohibited from seeing doctors of his choice. The original sentence of two-and-a-half years to the Kremlin critic was handed down on February 2 after ruling that while Navalny was in Germany, recovering from poisoning, he violated probation terms of a 2014 case in which he had received a suspended sentence of three and a half years. 

UN experts ‘extremely concerned’

He started his hunger strike on March 31 in order to pressure the prison authorities to provide him with medical assistance for the acute pain in his legs and back. The UN experts have said, “We are deeply troubled that Mr. Navalny is being kept in conditions that could amount to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment in a facility that reportedly does not meet international standards.”

“We are extremely concerned that the current danger to Mr. Navalny’s life, his most recent incarceration and the past attacks on him, including an attempt against his life last August with the nerve agent Novichok, which the Russian authorities have yet to effectively investigate, are all part of a deliberate pattern of retaliation against him for his criticism of the Russian Government and a gross violation of his human rights”, the experts added.

Image credits: AP