Press Release, 02.07.2014
YABLOKO leader Sergei Mitrokhin and member of YABLOKO Political Committee, member of Moscow Helsinki human rights group Valery Borshchev visited the ecologist Evgeny Vitishko at a penal colony in the Tambov region.

Meeting with head of the colony

Chair of the Public Observation comission of the Tambov region Alexandra Pavlikova and human rights advocate, member of the Public Observation comission Lidia Rybina were also present at the meeting.

Evgeny Vitishko spoke about the incarceration conditions which forced him to become human rights advocate for the prisoners.

Evgeny Vitishko

Small cavils in the colony have become a norm. The prisoners receive remarks and punishments for insignificant occasions. On the one hand, it’s connected with legislation imperfection but on the whole such attitude is created by the system itself. Vitishko himself was reprimanded for sitting on his bed at the wrong time.

According to Vitishko, the right of prisoners for speaking national languages is violated, the right for telephone communication with relatives is seriously restricted. There are two telephones in the colony for 600 people and only two hours are given for telephone task. There aren’t enough fridges, only two for 120 people.

Such attitude to people leads to emergency events. This way on May 1 2014 a riot was about to take place as several scores of prisoners weren’t given food as they didn’t write a claim for nutrition in the canteen. Theoretically they can cook themselves but the are no conditions for it in the colony.

But a more emergency event of late was a mass search of 30 prisoners in the punitive confinement. Federal Penal Service of the Tambov region sent 70 officers for this purpose. Vitishko said the prisoners were beaten with rubber truncheons during the search. He forwarded an appeal to Prosecutor’s Office about what has happened.

According to head of the colony (who was absent on the day of the search, his subordinates didn’t participate in the search as well) the facts stated by Vitishko were not confirmed. Everyone who was questioned said they were treated well.

Sergei Mitrokhin and Valery Borshchev are determined to forward an appeal to Prosecutor’s General demanding to conducted another check.

Mitrokhin expressed admiration with the courage and self-possession of Evgeny Vitishko. “Actually today he does a heroic action by protecting the people and resisting the system in the places where it tries to do away with him”.

Valery Borshchev says that colonies in the Tambov region have always been one of the best in Russia and violation of prisoners’ rights was a rare case but now there are alarming facts of violation of prisoners’ rights which should be checked.

“There are very few people like Evgeny Vitishko who care for public interests in the first place. Even in the colony he cares about the rights of prisoners. We’ve been working with penitentiaries for years but have never faced the incidents which Evgeny Vitishko describes especially that the search was conducted by workers of other colonies”, said Lidia Rybina.

However, the meeting with the ecologist didn’t go well. An agreement on using photo and video cameras was reached with heads of the colony and Vitishko wrote an allowance for using the materials. However, an officer at the colony snatched the camera and iPad from the hands of Sofya Rusova, adviser of YABLOKO chairman, during the meeting with Vitishko. Apart from all the photos of the meeting with Vitishko the colony staff delisted Sofya Rusova’s personal photographs.

YABLOKO leader and the human rights advocates believe that what Vitishko said during the meeting caused worries of the colony staff.

Lidia Rybina

Summing up, Sergei Mitrokhin and Evgeny Vitishko agreed on cooperation in publishing Vitishko’s publications and instructions on the behavior of political prisoners in the Russian prisons. Tomorrow we will publish an exclusive interview with Evgeny Vitishko at YABLOKO website.