Lawyer: Jailed Putin critic has spinal hernias
MOSCOW — A lawyer for imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who has complained of serious back and leg pain in custody, said Wednesday that doctors have found him to be suffering from two spinal hernias.
Vadim Kobzev told the Interfax news agency that Navalny also has a spinal protrusion and is beginning to lose feeling in his hands.
Navalny went on a hunger strike last week to protest what he called poor medical care in a Russian prison. On Tuesday, the leader of the Navalny-backed Alliance of Doctors union was detained by police after trying to get into the prison to talk to doctors.
Navalny, 44, is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s fiercest domestic opponent. He was arrested in January upon returning to Moscow from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerve-agent poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin. Russian authorities have rejected the accusation. Still, labs in Germany and elsewhere in Europe confirmed that Navalny was poisoned with the Soviet-era Novichok nerve agent.
A Russian court ordered Navalny in February to serve 2 ½ years in prison for violating the terms of his probation, including when he was convalescing in Germany, from a 2014 embezzlement conviction. Navalny has rejected the conviction as fabricated, and the European Court of Human Rights found it “arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable.”
Navalny’s imprisonment has brought wide criticism from the West. White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Wednesday: “We urge Russian authorities to take all necessary actions to ensure his safety and health,” adding that “we consider Mr. Navalny’s imprisonment on trumped-up charges to be politically motivated and a gross injustice, and we stand with like-minded allies and partners in calling for his immediate release.”