Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny report says “Whereabouts Unknown”

• Navalny is currently serving a 19-year prison sentence on charges of extremism.
• The United States said it was “deeply concerned”  and demanded he be released immediately.
• The prison authorities have frequently placed Alexei Navalny in solitary confinement.

Alexei Navalny expressed deep concern on Monday. They revealed that they had been unable to determine his whereabouts for the past six days. They suspect that he might have been transferred to a different facility.

Navalny is currently serving a 19-year prison sentence on charges of extremism, and a court decision this summer mandated his relocation to a more severe “special regime” prison colony.

His spokesperson, Kira Yarmysh, took to social media, stating, “We still do not know where Alexei is.” The lack of information has raised anxieties about Navalny’s well-being and detention conditions.

She said his lawyers tried to visit Navalny at the IK-6 facility in the Vladimir region of Russia. It is the place where he was being held and tried a “special regime” colony — IK-7 — in the same region.

“They have just been informed simultaneously in both colonies that he is not there,” Yarmysh said.

“They refuse to say where they have taken him,” she said in another post.

The United States said it was “deeply concerned” by reports that Navalny’s whereabouts were unknown and demanded he be released immediately.

“He’s now been gone for allegedly a week and neither his representatives nor his family know where he is,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.

“He should be released immediately, he should never have been jailed in the first place,” Kirby told journalists traveling with US President Joe Biden aboard Air Force One.

Alexei Navalny’s disappearance:

Following Alexei Navalny’s disappearance, the United States, through spokesperson Kirby, stated they would collaborate with the US embassy in Moscow to investigate his potential location.

Navalny’s vanishing act coincides with President Vladimir Putin’s announcement of his candidacy for a fifth term in the upcoming March elections, signaling his intention to extend his lengthy tenure.

In response to the conflict, Moscow has detained numerous individuals, including prominent political activists, for expressing criticism and drawing attention to alleged Russian military misconduct. Navalny’s supporters suspect that he may have been moved from the Vladimir region, heightening concerns about his safety and the growing repression against dissent in Russia.

“He can be anywhere,” said Leonid Volkov, another Navalny ally. “What’s worse, he could be transferred for several weeks.”

Russia’s expansive prison system typically requires weeks and at times even months, to transfer prisoners between distant facilities, often relying on rail transport.

In the past, prison authorities have frequently placed Alexei Navalny in solitary confinement, subjecting him to at least 266 days in such conditions. The opposition figure, grappling with various health issues and a noticeable weight loss while in prison, maintains contact with the outside world primarily through his legal representatives.

Navalny gained widespread support across Russia, sparking large-scale protests, before his imprisonment in 2021 on fraud charges. This followed his return from Germany, where he had been recuperating from a poisoning incident involving Novichok. Navalny and independent investigators assert that the poisoning was orchestrated by Russian agents.

In August, his initial sentence of nine years was more than doubled to 19 years. As Moscow prosecutors accused him of creating an organization that undermined public security by carrying out “extremist activities.”

Navalny created a network of political offices nationwide and a corruption watchdog that brought credible graft allegations against political elites.

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