Moscow (AsiaNews) - The Russian environmentalist Yevgeny Vitishko who denounced the damage caused to the territory during construction for the Sochi Winter Olympics currently underway on the Black Sea , has been transferred to an undisclosed penal colony, where he will serve three years. This was decided by a court of Krasnodar on 12 February. The forty year old geologist has become a symbol of the ongoing repression against the environmental movement in the Russian Caucasus. According to the Russian-Norwegian NGO Bellona, he was illegally transferred from the case to the administrative penal colony February 19, without being able to return home to his family and collect his things as allowed by the court of the Territory of Krasnodar region which includes Sochi.
The day on which the association for which he works (Environmental Watch on the North Caucasus, Ewnc) presented a report on the environmental damage of the Olympics in Moscow, the judges rejected Vitishko's lawyers appeal against the Tuapse court judgment (village near Sochi) , commuting into a jail term the probationary sentence imposed in 2012 for damage to the property of the local governor, Aleksand Tkachev. Along with another activist, the man is charged with having daubed a fence that surrounded the residence of the politician, in a protected forest, with slogans of protest.
The court had decided that it was hooliganism and had ordered his imprisonment, but with a suspended sentence and two years of probation. According to the judges, however, Vitishko repeatedly infringed the terms of his probation, not showing up on time to sign on at the police station. For groups such as Greenpeace Russia and Human Rights Watch the court's decision masks the political will to silence the local environmental movement and journalists who criticize the plans of the Winter Games , greatly desired by President Vladimir Putin.
"The decision to imprison Vitishko is based on the pressures of the political authorities - his lawyer Alexander Popkov said in court - The objective is to isolate him from the local and international community because of his activism". The activist learned of the judgment while he was already in prison serving 15 days of administrative detention for "foul language in a public place", another accusation held by the defenders of human rights as a pretext to keep him away from the media, in the days of the Olympics. Vitishko immediately began a hunger strike and a vast campaign of solidarity with him has been launched.
The now famous feminist punk band Pussy Riot, who arrived on the Black Sea to shoot a new video of protest against Putin, dedicated their performance to Vitishko. During their stay in Sochi, the girls were detained several times by police and FSB, on 18 February they were questioned for several hours about an alleged theft. According to their leader, Nadia Tolokonnikova , the episode - which attracted the attention of the international press - was a trick by authorities to divert attention from Vitishko's case. The WWF and Greenpeace have sent a letter to the President of international Olympic Committee (IOC ), Thomas Bach, to intervene in the case. "The story of Vitisko is not related to the preparation for the Olympics," IOC official Mark Adams limited himself to saying, adding: "We can not interfere with the affairs of a sovereign state". Since November, at least six members of EWNC have been arrested , some of them have also spent two weeks in jail. (N.A.)
