Jailed Putin critic Alexei Navalny was seen for the first time since he was moved to a Russian penal colony in the Arctic Circle, smiling and laughing while in court via video-link on Wednesday.
Russian news outlets released images of Navalny, in black prison garb and with a buzz cut, on a live TV feed from FKU IK-3 penal colony, a maximum security prison in the Arctic Circle town of Kharp, in the Yamalo-Nenets region about 1,200 miles northeast of Moscow.
At the hearing, Navalny cracked jokes about the Arctic weather and asked if officials at his former prison threw a party when he was transferred.
The video was beamed to a hearing in a court hundreds of miles away in the town of Kovrov, in the Vladimir region of central Russia, about 150 miles east of Moscow, near Penal Colony No. 6, where Navalny had been held until last month.
The hearing was for one of many lawsuits he filed against the penal colony – this particular one challenged one of his stints in a ‘punishment cell’.
Navalny is currently behind bars in FKU IK-3 penal colony, a maximum security prison in the Arctic Circle (pictured)
Navalny cracked jokes about the Arctic weather and asked if officials at his former prison threw a party when he was transferred
Jailed Putin critic Alexei Navalny (pictured) was seen for the first time since he was moved to a Russian penal colony in the Arctic Circle
In video footage and media reports from the hearing, Navalny, 47, joked about how much he had missed officials at his old prison and the Kovrov court officials, and about the harsh prison in Russia’s far north.
‘Conditions here (at the penal colony in Kharp) – and that’s a dig at you, esteemed defendants – are better than at IK-6 in Vladimir,’ Mr Navalny deadpanned, using the penal colony’s acronym.
‘There is one problem, though, and I don’t know which court to file a suit about it, the weather is bad here,’ he added with a chuckle.
He was transferred in December to the ‘special regime’ penal colony in Kharp, the highest security level of prisons in Russia.
Navalny, Vladimir Putin’s fiercest political foe, is serving time on charges of extremism.
He spent months in isolation at Prison Colony No. 6 before his transfer to IK-6. He was repeatedly placed in a tiny punishment cell over alleged minor infractions, like buttoning his prison uniform wrong.
They also refused to give him his post, deprived him of writing supplies, denied him food he had ordered and paid for in addition to regular meals, and would not allow visits from relatives, Navalny argued in his lawsuits, challenging his treatment.
He was transferred in December to the ‘special regime’ penal colony in Kharp, the highest security level of prisons in Russia
Navalny, Vladimir Putin’s fiercest political foe, is serving time on charges of extremism
He spent months in isolation at Prison Colony No. 6 before his transfer to IK-6
Navalny is still considered one of Putin’s greatest threats, despite being behind bars
A protester holds up placards at a gathering outside the Russian Embassy in support of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, in London on June 4, 2023
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, centre, attends a rally in Moscow, Russia on January 28, 2018
In the hearing on Wednesday, Navalny contested a stint in solitary confinement, and the judge ruled against him and sided with prison officials – as in other such lawsuits he filed.
Russian independent news site Mediazona reported that the court played a video of an incident last year in which he lashed out at a prison official who took away his pen.
The official then accused Navalny of insulting him, and he was put in the punishment cell for 12 days.
According to the report, Navalny admitted on Wednesday that he should not have ‘yelled’ at the official and ‘overdid it’ by calling him names, but he argued nonetheless that he was allowed to have the pen and should not have been punished by prison officials.
He also asked the penal colony’s representatives whether they celebrated his transfer with a ‘party, or a karaoke party’, drawing laughter from the judge, Mediazona reported.
Navalny has been behind bars since January 2021, when he returned to Moscow after recuperating in Germany from nerve agent poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin
Before his arrest he campaigned against official corruption, organised major anti-Kremlin protests and ran for public office
‘The thought that Putin will be satisfied with sticking me into a barracks in the far north and will stop torturing me in the punishment confinement was not only cowardly, but naive as well,’ he said
On Tuesday he said in a social media statement relayed from behind bars that prison officials in Kharp accused him of refusing to ‘introduce himself in line with protocol’
Navalny has been behind bars since January 2021, when he returned to Moscow after recuperating in Germany from nerve agent poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin.
Before his arrest he campaigned against official corruption, organised major anti-Kremlin protests and ran for public office.
He has since received three prison sentences, rejecting all the charges against him as politically motivated.
On Tuesday he said in a social media statement relayed from behind bars that prison officials in Kharp accused him of refusing to ‘introduce himself in line with protocol’, and also ordered him to serve seven days in an isolated punishment cell.
‘The thought that Putin will be satisfied with sticking me into a barracks in the far north and will stop torturing me in the punishment confinement was not only cowardly, but naive as well,’ he said.