ARTICLES
1- Wounded Russian Soldiers Returned to Front Without Proper Treatment – Agentstvo
The Moscow Times
1-12-2023
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/01/12/wounded-russian-soldiers-returned-to-front-without-proper-treatment-agentstvo-a79932
“A number of injured Russian soldiers are being sent back to the frontlines in Ukraine without permission from the military medical commission, the Agentstvo investigative outlet reported Thursday.
The presidential Human Rights Council is investigating cases in which servicemen didn’t receive proper medical treatment before being sent back into battle, council member Olga Demicheva told the state-run RIA Novosti news agency on Tuesday.
“We learned about a situation when soldiers who received high-tech medical care and with recommendations for rehabilitation were immediately sent to the front instead of rehabilitation,” Demicheva said.
Valentina Melnikova, the secretary of Russia’s Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers, also confirmed to Agentstvo that some soldiers were not receiving proper rehabilitation.
Russia has faced heavy casualties since invading Ukraine last February, and soldiers injured in battle are entitled to state benefits including financial compensation.
Over 10,700 Russian soldiers have been killed in the nearly 11 months since Moscow invaded Ukraine, according to a tally of confirmed military deaths kept by the BBC Russian Service and independent media outlet Mediazona.
Last September, Russia officially admitted to just 5,937 military deaths in Ukraine, while Western estimates put the figure at about 100,000.”
2- Russian Critic Navalny Says Prison Denying Hospital Care
1-11-2023
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/01/12/russian-critic-navalny-says-prison-denying-hospital-care-a79927
“Jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny said Wednesday that he was being refused access to hospital treatment by prison officials after falling sick, in what his team called an underhanded attempt to kill him.
Navalny, the most prominent opponent of Russian President Vladimir Putin, said he had flu symptoms including a fever but was being kept in a punishment cell at his maximum-security prison outside Moscow.
He also requested during a court hearing on Wednesday that it be postponed because of his illness.
“I am not being hospitalized even though I requested this,” Navalny was quoted by his team as saying during the hearing, adding that prison officials had also refused to provide basic drugs.
Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmysh, told AFP that judges had granted the postponement.
For the past two years, the 46-year-old has been held outside Vladimir, a town around 230 kilometers (145 miles) east of Moscow, after an embezzlement conviction, one of several rulings Navalny has denounced as an attempt to silence him.
A lawyer by training, Navalny has filed several lawsuits against penitentiary officials, claiming they have infringed his constitutional rights.
Earlier this week, Navalny said he was sharing his cell with a flu-stricken man, accusing officials of using the fellow inmate as a “biological weapon” to infect him.
Authorities have also placed a “mentally unwell person” in a nearby cell who has been “howling at night,” Navalny said.
His wife Yulia Navalnaya accused staff at the IK-6 prison of “torturing” him.
“Are you human?” she said in a post on Instagram
A post shared by Юлия Навальная (@yulia_navalnaya)
Navalny’s team claimed that the Kremlin wanted Navalny to die in prison.
“Putin is still trying to kill Navalny but in a quieter and slower manner compared to the Novichok poisoning,” the team said on the Telegram messaging app.
Navalny was poisoned with Novichok, a Soviet-made nerve agent, on a trip to Siberia in 2020. He barely survived, and accused Putin of being behind the attack.
In an open letter, hundreds of Russian doctors urged the authorities to stop “tormenting” Navalny and provide him with adequate care.
“The refusal of representatives of the Federal Penitentiary Service to hand Alexei the necessary medicines creates a direct threat to the life of Russian citizen Alexei Navalny,” the letter said.
U.S. State Department Spokesperson Ned Price tweeted on Wednesday: “We echo the concerns of more than 170 Russian doctors who are calling for an end to the mistreatment of Navalny and for provision of all appropriate medical care.”
3-Two hundred Russian doctors sign petition urging Putin to ‘stop abusing’ rival
Emma Brazell
Wednesday 11 Jan 2023 4:42 pm
https://metro.co.uk/2023/01/11/russian-doctors-sign-petition-urging-putin-to-stop-abusing-rival-18078358/
Russian doctors have united to condemn Vladimir Putin for ‘abusing’ a prominent political opposition leader whose ‘health is being deliberately harmed’ in jail.
More than 200 medics have signed a petition saying they are ‘greatly concerned’ for Aleksei Navalny’s life and can’t stand aside and watch him deteriorate.
The stand against the Kremlin is surprising, given the CLAMP-DOWN ON FREE SPEECH in the country following the Ukraine invasion.
Mr Navalny was handed a nine-year sentence in March after being found guilty of large-scale fraud and contempt by a Russian court. He pleaded not guilty.
He recently claimed he was placed in solitary confinement for the tenth time in a year because he washed his face half an hour before the prison schedule allowed.
Putin’s main political rival fell ill after sharing a cell with someone who had been ‘deliberately placed in the prison’s medical ward full of flu patients’, his lawyers have said.
In the letter, doctors said: ‘The detention conditions and the appearance of Aleksei Navalny make us greatly concerned for his life and health,
‘From the medical point of view, it is clear that Aleksei is not receiving sufficient medical help.’
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is Putin’s main rival in politics
Navalny says that he is facing new accusations that could extend his current nine-year prison term. Navalny said on Instagram that an investigator visited him in prison to declare that the authorities have opened a new criminal investigation against him on charges of ???creating an extremist group to fan hatred against officials and oligarchs??? and trying to stage rallies.
Russian authorities have levied new criminal charges against imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Russian authorities have added imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny and some of his top allies to the registry of terrorists and extremists, the latest move in a multi-pronged crackdown on opposition supporters, independent media and human rights activists.
Mr Navalny’s legal reps have warned he needs medication as he is said to be suffering from coughing fits, a fever and chills.
They say he needs to be examined by doctors outside the penal colony and transferred to a regular hospital for treatment if it’s thought necessary.
The politician is the leader of the Russia of the Future party and has repeatedly challenged Putin by organising anti-government demonstrations and exposing corruption.
In September 2020, he was hospitalised in a serious condition after being poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent.
American intelligence agencies believe that Russian security police agents were behind the attack on his life.
In January 2021, Mr Navalny was arrested on accusations of violating parole conditions while he was hospitalised in Germany – which were imposed as a result of a 2014 conviction for alleged embezzlement.
He was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison, before being handed nine further years when prosecutors accused him of embezzling donations from his supporters last year.
The politician has dismissed criminal cases against him as politically motivated and previously named Russia’s ruling party, United Russia, as a ‘party of crooks and thieves’.
Following the last court hearing into the most recent case, he wrote on Instagram: ‘If the prison term is the price of my human right to say things that need to be said … then they can ask for 113 years. I will not renounce my words or deeds.’