MOSCOW, November 7 (RAPSI) – Lawyers for the member of an all-female punk rock band member jailed over an anti-government stunt performance in a Moscow cathedral have lodged a new appeal for her release with the Supreme Court, a newspaper has reported.
The latest bid to secure the release of Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, who turned 24 years old on Thursday, comes as uncertainty persists over her current location after prison authorities announced more than two weeks ago that she was being transferred to another jail.
Tolokonnikova’s defense team say they submitted the appeal to human rights ombudsman Vladimir Lukin, who has promised to give his support to the application, business daily Vedomosti reported Thursday.
Tolokonnikova and two other members of the Pussy Riot group were jailed last August over a “punk prayer” in Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral that came after the head of the powerful Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, publicly backed Vladimir Putin’s 2012 presidential bid.
Tolokonnikova was moved out of her jail in the republic of Mordovia after recently declaring a hunger strike over the conditions of her detention. She also requested a criminal case be opened against her prison’s deputy warden, whom she accused of threatening her with murder.
Her precise current whereabouts have been unknown for around 18 days.
Tolokonnikova’s husband, Pyotr Verzilov, said he had been informed the Pussy Riot band member was being relocated to a prison colony in the territory of Krasnoyarsk, located 3400 kilometers (2100 miles) east of Moscow, but authorities have yet to confirm that information.
