Russia Issues Arrest Warrant Against Belarusian Revealing Systematic Tortures In Russian Prisons

Russia included a citizen on your wanted list Belarusian who applied for political asylum in France, after he had revealed systematic rape and torture perpetrated in Russian prisons.

According to an advertisement posted on the website of the Russian Interior Ministry, Sergei Savelev, 31, is being searched for a link to a criminal case, without providing further details.

This young man was imprisoned for seven and a half years in Russia for drug trafficking and finally released in February 2021.

During his incarceration, taking advantage of a computer maintenance operation, he downloaded a large number of videos showing torture and systematic rape in the Russian prison system.

At the beginning of October, the publication of one of these shocking videos, showing the rape of a prisoner in a hospital-prison in Saratov, sparked a major scandal in Russia.

The Kremlin promised to open various investigations into these mistreatments and at least four prison officials were fired.

However, claiming to fear possible reprisals from the Russian authorities, Savelev traveled to France last week, requesting political asylum.

In an interview with AFP, he stated that he had decided to release the document because it was “psychologically very difficult” to keep these horrors only to himself.

This Saturday, he also pointed out that he was being persecuted in Russia “for disclosing state secrets.”

“The Russian power uses those methods that it knows and considers appropriate, that is, force and intimidation, and still tries to silence me,” he said in a video published by Gulagu.net.

According to Savelev, the authorities prefer “to waste their time trying to silence the truth”, instead of “reforming their prison system” and penalizing all those “involved in a torture factory.”

“The same Russian security services reveal the true nature (of the acts) and try to silence the man who helped alert the world about crimes against humanity,” said the NGO in a message on its account on the Telegram network.

Very often the Russian prison system is accused of torture scandals, committed in an almost institutionalized way by guards or inmates under their orders, especially to obtain confessions under duress.