Watchdog

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia -- Russian human rights campaigners draped a huge banner from a St. Petersburg bridge calling for the release of jailed activist Ildar Dadin, who says he has been tortured in prison.

Eight activists from the rights group Vesna (Spring) hung the banner reading "Dadin's Freedom Is Russia's Freedom" from Tsarskoselsky Bridge on December 7. They stood on the bridge and held lit torches.

Dadin, 34, became the first Russian citizen jailed for participating in more than two unsanctioned public gatherings in 180 consecutive days under a controversial 2014 law that critics say is part of a redoubled Kremlin effort to stifle dissent during President Vladimir Putin's third term.

Dadin received a three-year sentence in December 2015, and it was later reduced by six months.

Dadin made the torture accusations in an open letter in November that has shone a spotlight on claims of widespread abuse in Russia's prisons and jails.

Russian prison officials have said they found no evidence to support Dadin's allegations.

Also on December 7, another group of activists held a series of single-person protests in St. Petersburg demanding the release of several people they say have been jailed on politically motivated charges.

The Kazakh Parliament's lower chamber has approved a bill on an amnesty for some 30,000 people who are behind bars in the Central Asian nation.

President Nursultan Nazarbaev proposed the amnesty to mark the 25th anniversary of Kazakhstan's independence, and the Mazhilis approved it on December 7.

The bill is expected to be approved by the upper chamber, the Senate, and signed into law by Nazarbaev before Independence Day on December 16.

Deputy Prosecutor-General Iogan Merkel has said that the amnesty would affect 30,000 convicts and people held in pretrial detention.

He said 1,800 of them would be freed and the rest would have their prison terms shortened.

Merkel also said that some 36,000 people are currently either serving prison sentences or awaiting trial in the country of 17 million.

Kazakhstan's last mass amnesty for prisoners was adopted in 2011 in honor of the 20th anniversary of the independence and affected nearly 27,000 prisoners.

Kazakhstan announced its independence on December 16, 1991, the last of the 15 Soviet republics to do so.

Based on reporting by Tengrinews and Kazinform