Doctors Examine Jailed Pussy Riot Member On Hunger Strike

Jailed Pussy Riot member Maria Alyokhina

Russian prison authorities say doctors have examined a jailed Pussy Riot member, who has been on hunger strike for almost a week.

Officials at Russia's Federal Service of Correctional Institutions said on May 28 that Maria Alyokhina was treated in her penitentiary’s medical unit for low blood pressure.

Alyokhina's lawyer says she was not allowed to see her client.

Alyokhina started her hunger strike last week, demanding to be present at her parole hearing physically, not via video-link.

The court rejected Alyokhina's request and she was denied parole on May 23.

Alyokhina and another Pussy Riot member, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, are serving two-year jail sentences after being convicted of hooliganism.

The members of the feminist performance-art group were arrested after staging a protest against President Vladimir Putin in an Orthodox cathedral in Moscow in February 2012.

Based on reporting by ITAR-TASS and Interfax