Outspoken Kremlin critic and opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza, serving a 25-year sentence for anti-war statements against Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, has been transferred to a punitive cell unit (EPKT) in Siberia and immediately placed in solitary confinement for allegedly "persistently violating" the prison's internal regulations.
Kara-Murza's lawyer, Maria Eismont, said on January 30 that she received a letter from Kara-Murza in which he wrote that he had been removed from a prison in Omsk four days earlier and sent to EPKT for being a "malicious offender."
Eismont said her client, who is serving the longest known sentence of all of President Vladimir Putin's jailed critics, informed her that the decision to move Kara-Murza, who has steadfastly denied the treason charges he was convicted of, came after he was accused of failing to get up at the morning wake-up command that is usually announced via loudspeakers.
Kara-Murza wrote to her that the speaker system was not switched on that day.
Placement into the EPKT, which stands for unified cell-type premises, is considered the harshest type of incarceration in Russia's correctional colonies. Unlike in regular parts of penal colonies where inmates can move around, work, visit a library or prayer rooms, or engage in other leisure activities, those incarcerated in EPKT serve time in cells and are isolated from the rest of the correctional facility.
Kara-Murza wrote that he will be kept in EPKT for four months, until May 26, after which he is supposed to be moved back to the correctional colony No. 6. The term in EPKT, however, may be prolonged if guards flag him for any other "violations."
On January 29, Kara-Murza's friend, noted rights defender Aleksandr Podrabinek, raised concerns over Kara-Murza's whereabouts after a letter sent to him at the correctional colony No. 6 in Omsk was marked undeliverable as the prisoner had been moved.
Kara-Murza, 42, who holds Russian and British passports, was initially arrested in April 2022 after returning to Russia from abroad and charged with disobeying a police officer.
He was later charged with discrediting the Russian military, a charge stemming from Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine and a Kremlin push to stamp out criticism of the subject. He was later additionally charged with treason over remarks he made in speeches outside Russia that criticized Kremlin policies.
In April last year, Kara-Murza was found guilty of all charges and sentenced to 25 years in prison. He and his supporters reject the charges as politically motivated.