Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny transferred to prison hospital amid hunger strike
Russian officials said Monday that jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny has been transferred to a prison hospital following reports that his health was rapidly deteriorating and that he could die “at any moment.”
The prominent Kremlin critic, who survived a nerve-agent poisoning last year, is in the third week of a hunger strike to protest his prison conditions and authorities’ refusal to provide him with adequate medical treatment for severe back pain and numbness in his left leg.
Prison officials announced Monday that Navalny would be transferred to an infirmary in another colony in the Vladimir region and that his condition was deemed “satisfactory.” His doctors and representatives immediately cautioned the public not to trust what they were hearing from officials, saying it’s unclear whether Navalny consented to being transferred.
Dr. Anastasia Vasilyeva, head of the Navalny-backed Alliance of Doctors union, said the facility he was transferred to is used to treat critically ill prisoners, including those with tuberculosis.
“This is not a hospital where they can diagnose and prescribe treatment for his problems,” Vasilyeva said in a tweet, calling the transfer a “Gestapo decision to forcibly inoculate tuberculosis in a person with a weakened immune system.”
Ivan Zhdanov, the head of Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation, said the move is further proof that the politician’s condition has worsened. Navalny’s team warned over the weekend that Navalny “could die at any moment.”
The latest development in the case comes as Navalny’s supporters call for large-scale protests this Wednesday, the same day President Vladimir Putin is set to deliver his annual address to the country’s legislature. Zhdanov suggested in a tweet that the hospital transfer is an attempt by the government to announce “good news” about Navalny’s condition ahead of the rally.
“Don’t be fooled,” he warned.
Navalny, 44, blames Putin and his administration for last summer’s assassination attempt. Putin has denied any role in Navalny’s poisoning even though German doctors who treated him said the substance used in the plot was Novichok, a deadly nerve agent developed by the Soviet Union.
The corruption investigator was jailed immediately after returning to Russia in January for violating the terms of his probation by leaving the country to get medical treatment in Germany. The probation stems from a 2014 fraud conviction that his supporters denounce as fabricated and an attempt at preventing him from running against Putin.
President Biden’s National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN on Sunday that “that there will be consequences” if Navalny dies.
