After outrage, Navalny moved to prison hosp

MOSCOW: Russian authorities decided to move opposition leader Alexey Navalny to a prison hospital after allies warned his health was failing in the third week of a hunger strike and the US threatened the Kremlin with unspecified “consequences” if he dies.

Navalny is in “satisfactory condition,” the local branch of the federal penitentiary service said in a website statement on Monday. He agreed to “vitamin therapy” and is getting daily examinations from a doctor, it said.

The transfer means Navalny’s condition has “worsened so much that even the torture chamber admits it”, Ivan Zhdanov, head of the activist’s anti-corruption foundation, wrote in Twitter.

The 44-year-old’s condition has become the latest flashpoint in the growing tensions between Russia and the West. The US and Europe are pressing President Vladimir Putin to ensure proper medical care for Navalny, who began a hunger strike in prison March 31 to demand access to his personal doctors for acute back and leg pains. The opposition leader’s supporters on Sunday called for protests across Russia on April 21, the day Putin is due to give his annual state-of-the-nation address, after warning that the Kremlin’s most outspoken critic may be only days from death.

The Kremlin on Monday dismissed concerns from Western countries over the health of jailed opposition figure Alexei Navalny, who began a hunger strike three weeks ago, and said it was not monitoring his health.

“The health of convicts in the Russia Federation cannot and should not be a topic for their interests,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, referring to Western countries, adding that, “we do not monitor the health status of Russian prisoners”.

The Kremlin also said Russia would continue to respond in kind if further sanctions were imposed, after new US measures last week targeting sovereign debt and blacklisting Russian companies prompted Moscow to retaliate.