Anti-government protester says he is being beaten, tortured and threatened with death at notorious Karelia penal colony

A Russian dissident jailed under a controversial new Kremlin law says he is being beaten, repeatedly tortured and threatened with murder at the penal colony where he is being held in north-west Russia.



Ildar Dadin says he is the victim of systematic abuse perpetrated by the head of the prison, Maj Sergey Kossiev, and his staff. He alleges that Kossiev has told him that if he complains about his treatment he will be killed and secretly buried.

A Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters on Tuesday that President Vladimir Putin would be informed of the allegations, while Russian media reported that the regional branch of Russia’s investigative committee would look into Dadin’s claims.

In response to the letter, Amnesty International has called for Dadin’s release. “We are urging Russian authorities to end the pattern of impunity for torture and other ill treatment and investigate Ildar Dadin’s appalling allegations,” Sergei Nikitin, the director of Amnesty International Russia, said. “They must also immediately and unconditionally release Ildar Dadin, and provide him with full remedy for the injustice done to him.”

Dadin, 34, was jailed in 2015 after staging a series of anti-government protests. He was convicted under a new law which criminalises public assembly, and given a three-year sentence, which was later cut to two and a half.

In the letter to his wife, Anastasia, smuggled out of prison by his lawyer, he described having all of his belongings confiscated, and claims two razor blades were planted on him as an excuse to send him to solitary confinement by way of “punishment”.

The following day he says Kossiev arrived with three prison warders and began to beat him. “Over the course of that day, I was beaten a total four times, by 10-12 people at once. They would kick me,” he writes. “After the third beating, they lowered my head into a toilet right there in the holding cell.”

He goes on to describe being cuffed and hung from the ceiling. “Being suspended in this manner brought about terrible pain in the wrists, twisted out my elbows, and caused horrible back pain. I was suspended like that for half an hour.

“Then they took off my underwear and said they would bring another prisoner to rape me unless I stopped my hunger strike.”

The prison boss later allegedly told Dadin that if he complained his beatings could be made worse, and he could be killed and buried “under the fence”.

Dadin also claims he is being beaten “several times a day” as well as bullied and routinely humiliated. “This is happening with the other prisoners, as well,” he writes.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the oligarch who spent 10 years in jail in Russia before being amnestied in 2013, told the Guardian he was familiar with these conditions. Khodorkovsky said he was locked up in the same penal colony in Karelia after being convicted for a second time.

“Ildar Dadin has finished up in the same prison camp, simply for protesting peacefully and for expressing his personal views. Before I was there, in Soviet times, political prisoners were locked up there too,” he says.

“It’s an extremely tough place. In recent years the prison authorities specialised in ‘breaking’ serious criminals using illegal methods. I’m afraid we’re once more in times where the new task is the intimidation of political activists.”



Russian prison officials cast doubt on the claims. “Not one physical injury has been found on Dadin,” said the deputy head of Russia’s prison service, Valery Maksimenko, according to the Russian news agency Interfax.

Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta quoted an unidentified local prison service official as acknowledging that physical force had been used on Dadin, but only when he refused to leave his cell or defied prison guards. Dadin denies the accusations.

Bill Browder, the chief executive of Hermitage Capital investment fund, said Dadin’s treatment was reminiscent of that meted out to his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky. Magnitsky was jailed and died in prison in 2009 after uncovering a $230m (£188m) tax fraud carried out by senior Kremlin officials.

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Browder said those responsible for torturing Dadin should be put on the Magnitsky sanctions list, introduced by the US and several EU countries. The act freezes the assets of Russian officials who violate human rights.

“What shocked me is that they hung him up by his wrists. It brought me right back to seven years ago when Sergei Magnitsky was killed,” Browder said. “I pray it doesn’t happen to Dadin.”

Approximately 50 people went to the Moscow headquarters of the Federal Penitentiary Service on Tuesday night to submit requests for an investigation into Dadin’s mistreatment, a photographer at the scene said.

Ildar Dadin’s letter in full

Nastya! If you decide to publish this information about what is happening to me, then try to distribute it as widely as possible. This will increase my chances of staying alive.

Know that there is an entire mafia operating at penal colony 7. It involves the entire administration, among them the colony’s head Major Sergey Leonidovich Kossiev and the vast majority of its employees, including the doctors.

Upon my arrival at the colony on 10 September, I had practically all of my things taken away from me. Two razor blades were then planted [amongst my remaining possessions] and subsequently “discovered” during an inspection. This is a common practice here – it gives them grounds to throw all newcomers into solitary confinement, to ensure they immediately understand the hell that they found themselves in.

I was put into solitary without any official orders. All of my things were taken away, including soap, my toothbrush, toothpaste, and even toilet paper. In protest of these illegal activities, I went on a hunger strike.

On 11 September, the colony head Kossiev came to me with three employees. Together, they started beating me. Over the course of that day, I was beaten a total four times, by 10-12 people at once. They would kick me. After the third beating, they lowered my head into a toilet right there in the holding cell.

On 12 September, [several] employees cuffed my hands behind my back and hung me up. Being suspended in this manner brought about terrible pain in the wrists, twisted out my elbows, and caused horrible back pain. I was suspended like that for half an hour. Then they took off my underwear and said they would bring another prisoner to rape me unless I stopped my hunger strike.

I ask you to publish this letter because there is a information blockade and I see no other way to break through it

After that, I was brought to Kossiev’s office, where he said to me in the presence of other staff: “You have been beaten very little. If I give the order, you will be beaten much worse. If you try to complain, they will kill you and bury you under the fence.” After that, they beat me regularly, several times a day. Regular beatings, bullying, humiliation, insults, intolerable detention conditions – this is happening with the other prisoners, as well.

All subsequent punishments were based on blatant lies. All of the videos in which I was [filmed] being “penalised” were staged: before filming, they would tell me how to behave and what to do – not to argue, not to protest, to look at the floor.

Otherwise, they said, they would kill [me] and no one would know about it, because no one knows where I am. I cannot send letters without going through the administration first, and the administration has promised to kill me if I write any complaints.

Nastya, I ask you to publish this letter because there is a real “information blockade” in this place and I see no other opportunities to break through it. I am not asking you to get me out of here or to have me transferred to another facility. I have repeatedly seen and heard how other prisoners are being beaten, so my conscience will not allow me to run away from here. I am going to fight to help others. I am not afraid of death. Most of all, I am afraid not being able to withstand the torture and surrendering.

If the Committee Against Torture [a Russian human rights NGO] has not yet been destroyed in Russia, I ask for their assistance in ensuring my right to life and security and those of other prisoners in Russia. I ask to you to openly reveal that Major Kossiev has directly threatened to murder me for any attempt to complain about what is happening. I will be glad if you find an attorney who will be able to reside in Segezha [near the colony] and provide legal support.

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Time is against me. Surveillance footage would be able to prove [that such] torture and beatings [are happening], but it is becoming less and less likely that such footage remains intact. If I am again subjected to torture, beatings and rape, it is unlikely that I will last more than a week.

In case of my sudden death, you may be told that I committed suicide, had an accident, was shot while trying to escape, or [died] fighting with another prisoner, but this would be a lie. [My murder] would have been planned in advance to eliminate witnesses and victims of torture.

I love you and I hope to see you someday. Your Ildar.

This letter was transcribed by Dadin’s lawyer, Alexei Plutser, and translated from Russian by by Meduza.io