"Stop the torture!": Detainees on January 31 are still kept in paddy wagons

OVD-Info reports about the hours-long queues in which there are paddy wagons with those detained at the rallies on 31 January. People subjected to administrative arrest in Moscow are in paddy wagons in front of a special detention center in the village of Sakharovo. Police said they could keep people in them for up to 48 hours.

“There are from five to nine transport vehicles in line, arrested people say. It is known that in one of them there are 31 people with 23 seats", - Kommersant reports.

The detainees report that after they were loaded into a paddy wagon at the Yuzhnoye Medvedkovo police station at 11 am on February 1, and until now they have not been given any water or food and are not allowed to go to the toilet.

According to The Insider, citing the appeals of the detainees, people are tortured for many hours.

“More than 40 hours have passed since the arrest, and we are still being tortured. We were practically not fed. For the last 9 hours we have been on the bus, people have to stand. We are deprived of the ability to move, we have no water, we are not taken to the toilet. Here, at the detention center for foreign citizens in the village of Sakharovo, dozens of cars with detainees are kept in the same conditions. We demand from the HRC, the Moscow Internal Affairs Directorate and the Prosecutor General's Office to immediately stop these bullying!”- the newspaper quotes the words of one of the detainees.

A similar torture situation has developed in St. Petersburg, where queues stand in a long queue in front of the special detention center on Zakharyevskaya Street. They have been standing since 22:00 on February 1, while the prisoners are deprived of drink and hot food. The police warn the detainees that the registration of the arrests will take a very long time. There are not enough places for administrative detainees. Prisoners detained at peaceful rallies are threatened to be placed in the same cell with criminals.

The arrested persons in the paddy wagons report that from time to time on the buses where the detainees are, they turn on and off the engine. As a result, "alternately it gets cold when the paddy wagon is turned off, it becomes impossible to breathe due to the exhaust gases when it is turned on".

Human rights defenders and lawyers speak unequivocally about the violation of basic human rights. Yes, the police have the right to detain citizens for up to 48 hours. But there is no law in any way that people can be kept on buses when they are entitled to hot food, access to toilets, a mattress and a pillow with bedding.

The head of the HRC Valery Fadeev told Podyem that this issue is now being dealt with by members of the Human Rights Council: “We are trying to find out what and how, why this is happening. In an hour and a half I will understand what is happening and how we can help them".

Protest actions in support of Alexey Navalny and other political prisoners in Russia took place on January 23 and 31. At uncoordinated rallies, security officials across the country detained over 10,000 people. Judging by the gigantic queues at the special detention centers, the Russian prison system was not ready to receive so many detainees.