"16 hours on an iron stool": Navalny complains of pain in solitary confinement

Solitary confinement is bad for the health of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny.

"16 hours on an iron stool": Navalny complains of pain in solitary confinement

Solitary confinement is bad for the health of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny. The 46-year-old reports that he can only stand or squat uncomfortably in his cell. Now he is struggling to get more information about his health condition.

The imprisoned Kremlin critic Alexej Navalny complains of increasing back pain due to the constant solitary confinement. "You lock a person in an isolated punishment cell, where they can either stand or sit on an iron stool for 16 hours a day. In a month, even a healthy person's back hurts under these conditions," the opposition politician said on his social networks . He himself has been in solitary confinement almost constantly for three months.

The prison doctor did examine him, but only for about five minutes. After that, she would not have informed him of the diagnosis even after repeated requests, Navalny continued to report. He then got injections prescribed by her. When he asked what they contained, he was told: "We inject what the doctor prescribed. Vitamin B, for example." Vitamins are great, according to Navalny, but the injections don't help his pain "and in general I feel a little uncomfortable when I'm injected with an unfamiliar drug."

He finally requested a copy of his medical file, which was handed over to him only in an illegible condition. The 46-year-old posted pictures of the doctor's papers to prove it, writing, "Guess what it is." The prominent critic of Putin announced that he would now complain that he was "able to read" his medical records.

Because of alleged fraud, Navalny is in penal colony 6 in Melekhovo, about 260 kilometers northeast of Moscow - under particularly harsh prison conditions. In May, a court upheld the nine-year prison sentence. Internationally, he is considered a political prisoner and the harshest critic of Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin. Navalny had recovered from a poison attack in Germany in August 2020, but then returned to Russia voluntarily and has been in prison ever since.