Jailed Putin rival Alexei Navalny lacking, moved to undisclosed location

Putin critic Alexei Navalny has been abruptly transferred to an undisclosed location, elevating security considerations concerning the jailed Russian opposition chief.

High aides to Navalny have sounded the alarms that they have no idea the place he's situated, why authorities opted to maneuver him, and what the Russian authorities plans on doing to him.

JAILED PUTIN RIVAL ALEXEI NAVALNY FACES ADDITIONAL 15 YEARS BEHIND BARS

“Alexei Navalny was transported away from the penal colony No. 2. His lawyer, who got here to see him, was stored on the checkpoint till 14.00, and was then informed: ‘There isn't a such convict right here,'” Navalny spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh tweeted. “We have no idea the place Alexei is now and what colony they're taking him to."

The dissident's chief of employees, Leonid Volkov, issued an identical assertion on his Telegram channel. None of Navalny's relations or kinfolk had been notified about his obvious jail switch, Yarmysh mentioned.

“Neither Alexei’s attorneys nor his kinfolk had been knowledgeable about his switch prematurely. There have been rumors that he was going to be transferred to the high-security penal colony IK-6 ‘Melekhovo,’ however it's unattainable to know when, and if, he'll really arrive there,” Yarmysh continued.

In Could, Navalny fretted that Russian authorities would possibly transfer him to the Melekhovo jail, a facility that has confronted allegations of systematic torture and sexual violence, the Day by day Mirror reported.

"My new sentence has not but entered into drive, however I've heard rumors that I will be transferred to the high-security colony in Melekhovo, the place convicts get their fingernails pulled out," he wrote on Twitter final month.

Navalny is at present serving an 11-1/2-year jail sentence and cautioned final month he might face an extra 15 years as a result of a contemporary prison case in opposition to him. The brand new case alleges he created an "extremist group as a way to incite hatred in the direction of officers and oligarchs." His present sentence is the results of fraud and contempt of courtroom prices.

Western officers akin to Secretary of State Antony Blinken have repeatedly rebuked Russia for its remedy of Navalny and known as for his launch. Navalny has been a fervent critic of his personal authorities, lambasting it as a bastion of thieves and criminals. He's the top of Russia of the Future, an opposition occasion to the ruling United Russia Get together and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Navalny was most lately arrested in January 2021 when he returned to Russia from Germany after being handled for an alleged nerve agent assault. Navalny has publicly speculated the Novichok-class nerve agent poisoning assault originated from Russian state brokers. The Kremlin has forcefully denied any involvement.

Regardless of the alleged assassination try and his imprisonment, Navalny has remained undeterred in his disparagement of the Russian authorities and Putin, lately condemning the bloody conflict in Ukraine and inspiring his Russian followers to protest the violence inflicted upon their neighbor.

Quite a lot of staunch critics of Putin have died beneath suspicious circumstances. In latest months, a number of Russian oligarchs have additionally been discovered useless beneath peculiar circumstances. This, coupled with Navalny's candor, has triggered considerations that the Kremlin would possibly attempt to assassinate him.

“So long as we don’t know the place Alexei is, he stays one-on-one with the system that has already tried to kill him," Yarmysh mentioned, "so our principal process now could be to find him as quickly as attainable.”