The administration of the Russian colony is increasing pressure on Ivan Yatskin, a Crimean convicted by a Russian court

The administration of the correctional colony No. 5 in the city of Kemerovo is increasing pressure on Ivan Yatskin, a Crimean convicted by a Russian court and held in prison on the territory of the Russian Federation. This was reported by former Kremlin prisoner and journalist Vladislav Yesipenko.

“The administration of the correctional colony No. 5 in the city of Kemerovo (Russian Federation) is increasing pressure on the Ukrainian political prisoner, the Crimean Ivan Yatskin. Despite his serious health condition – progressive trophic ulcers on his legs – the convict was transferred to a “special” unit for dangerous prisoners. He is forced to stay on his feet in the local area for hours, despite his illness, and to read the rules of the internal regulations. There is constant moral pressure from the so-called active part of the unit. The penitentiary staff resort to systematic provocations. This is the seventh year of his captivity,” Yesipenko wrote.

Earlier, Yesipenko reported that Yatskin needs medication and asks to send a cane.

Ivan Yatskin was detained by Russian security forces on October 16, 2019 in Crimea on suspicion of treason. This became known in December 2019. The Russian investigation claimed that while in Crimea, Yatskin provided the Security Service of Ukraine with information that “constitutes a state secret of Russia.” The SBU reported that Ivan Yatskin did not cooperate with the Security Service of Ukraine.

In May 2021, a panel of judges of the Russian-controlled Supreme Court of Crimea, headed by Presiding Judge Alla Khinevich, sentenced Yatskin to 11 years in a maximum-security colony with a one-year suspension on charges of “high treason.”

In February 2022, lawyer Mykola Polozov reported that Ivan Yatskin was being oppressed in a Russian colony because of his Ukrainian origin. According to his defense attorney, Yatskin had been on a hunger strike.

In June 2022, the Supreme Court of Russia rejected an appeal against the sentence against Crimean Ivan Yatskin.