MOSCOW, November 18 (RIA Novosti) – Greenpeace activists currently facing trial in Russia after mounting a protest at oil drilling in the Arctic Sea have few complaints about prison conditions but are being hampered by the language barrier, a state rights watchdog said Monday.
Mikhail Fedotov, who heads the Kremlin rights council, visited two of the three detention facilities in the northern city of St. Petersburg in which the group of 28 activists and two journalists are being held.
All 30 people were initially charged with piracy for attempting in September to scale an oil platform owned by an affiliate of state-run energy giant Gazprom, but those charges were later downgraded to hooliganism, an offense punishable by up to seven years in jail.
Fedotov wrote on his official blog on the Kremlin website that pre-detention facilities he visited lack any English-language books and magazines.
Inmates are of little help as most speak no English, and an official translator helps only during conversations with detention facility staff, Fedotov said.
Television offers a respite, but prison television sets can only receive one or two channels and the signal is weak, Fedotov said, noting that officials said the facility’s thick walls interfere with reception.
But Fedotov said there were relatively few complaints about the quality of the prisons, except for the mattresses, which are reportedly “too thin to sleep normally.”
Greenpeace said last week that the Investigative Committee, which is handling the case, wants to keep the group in custody for three more months in defiance of mounting international criticism.
The Kremlin’s rights council has spoken against the case previously. The advisory body has a track record of criticizing the authorities over high-profile cases, but usually with little effect on judicial proceedings.
