Navalny blames harsh jail regime
MOSCOW — Imprisoned Russian Opposition Leader Alexei Navalny has lost a substantial amount of weight in custody, his organisation said on Thursday, a day after the wellknown government critic called a hunger strike to protest what he called poor medical care.
A post on Thursday on Navalny’s channel in the Telegram messaging app said he weighed 93kg (204 pounds) when he arrived at the prison last month and now is at 85kg (187 pounds).
The statement said he blamed the weight loss primarily on a harsh prison regime in which he was awakened eight times every night.
Navalny also is complaining of severe back pains that have spread to one leg and says his other leg is numb.
Prison authorities have not provided proper medicine or allowed his doctor to visit him, he said on Wednesday when announcing he was going on a hunger strike.
The 44-year-old Navalny, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s most outspoken domestic opponent, was arrested in January upon his return from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerveagent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin.
Russian authorities have rejected the accusation.
Last month, Navalny was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for violating the terms of his probation during his convalescence in Germany.
The sentence stems from a 2014 embezzlement conviction that Navalny has rejected as fabricated — and which the European Court of Human Rights has ruled to be unlawful.