Jailed Anti-Putin Protester 'in Danger' after 50 Days without Food
Jailed anti-Kremlin protester Sergei Krivov, who has gone for 50 days without food in protest of his trial, is in danger and not getting medical help from prison staff, his lawyer said Thursday.
Sergei Krivov is one of 15 people being held in pretrial detention for taking part in a violent protest that was held on the eve of President Vladimir Putin's May 7, 2012 swearing in for a third term.
The demonstration ended in clashes with police on the Bolotnaya square near the Kremlin. Krivov faces up to 10 years in prison on charges of taking part in a mass riot and attacking law enforcement officials.
"He's putting on a brave face, but his health is poor, and you can see that he has changed," said his lawyer Vyacheslav Makarov.
"They have stopped weighing him because he has lost a lot of weight. They took his blood pressure once," he said.
Makarov said Krivov only has access to tap water to drink in his cell.
Krivov was arrested in October 2012 as part of the high-profile investigation of the rally, in which 27 people are being prosecuted, 15 of whom have been in held in remand centers for more than a year.
Prosecutors accuse Krivov, a 52-year-old physicist, of grabbing a riot policeman's rubber baton and pushing another officer in the crowd.
The defense argues that video footage of Krivov does not prove the allegations.
Observers at the trial have said that Krivov, a cheerful bespectacled man, has visibly shrunken and looks sallow and unhealthy, and his lawyer expressed concern for his life.
Although his client needs a full medical check, prison doctors are not likely to attend to his needs, Makarov said.
He also expressed concern that Krivov may become another "lost" prisoner like Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer who alleged police corruption and whose death in pretrial detention caused an international outcry.
"He may never start eating," Makarov told AFP, "He's passed that threshold, he might just continue and die. It's very dangerous."
The Bolotnaya case was launched swiftly after the protest and is seen by many as a turning point in the Kremlin's policies toward the political opposition which turned to a crackdown.
Police behavior at the protest has been decried by rights activists, who say the authorities provoked the violence by having the police block the passage of the crowd and spark panic.
Krivov started refusing food on September 19 in protest of the case proceedings. His lawyer said he has not been provided with hearing transcripts in time to mount a defense strategy.
He had held another hunger strike in January, when he refused food for about 40 days in protest of his pre-trial detention.
Source: Agence France Presse
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