EPLN and the Public Verdict Foundation have drawn the attention of the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) to severe violations of prisoners’ rights in Russia, particularly in the areas of health and work, and highlighted the practice of “predatory recruitment” of prisoners to wage war in Ukraine. The CESCR will examine our reports during its 78th session this September.
Read the SUBMISSIONS here and here & on the CESCR session’s page
HEALTH
The Russian prison healthcare system suffers from serious structural shortcomings, with devastating consequences for prisoners’ health.
- The prison health system is severely underdeveloped. Documented cases in our submission show that prisoners’ medical needs are sometimes ignored, forcing them to break prison rules simply to draw attention to their condition. In some colonies, no medical service exists at all.
- Access to external medical care is at the discretion of the prison administration and is allowed only after inferior internal prison treatments have been exhausted. The system is structured so that prisoners cannot demonstrate the unavailability of necessary care until severe complications arise and transfers to hospitals often take place only shortly before death. Prisoners are thus kept under the authority of the prison administration even when their health is critically deteriorated, amounting to a violation of their right to dignity.
- Prisoners who wish to pay for a specialist of their choice face numerous administrative and financial obstacles. Furthermore, the decision to involve an external specialist ultimately rests with the prison administration, giving it yet another tool of pressure over prisoners.
- The duality of civilian and prison health systems – where prison healthcare remains under penitentiary authority and operates in parallel – impedes continuity of care and the development of coherent treatment strategies.
- Because prison medical services are subordinated to the prison administration, they fail in their essential role of documenting ill-treatment and torture. This subordination enables practices ranging from passive complicity to the active concealment of torture.
These systemic flaws demonstrate that, as long as prison healthcare remains under the penitentiary system, the priorities of the prison service prevail over medical needs, distorting the very mission of healthcare. Integrating prison healthcare into the public health system would:
- improve access to timely, high-quality medical care, including specialist treatment;
- ensure continuity of care between prison and community services; and
- restore the essential role of health practitioners in torture prevention and documentation.
EPLN and Public Verdict urge the Committee to press the Russian authorities to:
- Transfer prison healthcare to the Ministry of Health, as envisaged in 2019 but not implemented to date;
- Establish an effective system of release on medical grounds, accompanied by fair trial safeguards.
WORK
Forced labour remains the norm in Russian prisons, legally mandated for all sentenced prisoners. As of 2020, 58% of all prisoners were employed, with authorities setting a target of 85% by 2030.
Prisoners are exploited as a cheap workforce. They are compelled to work in unsafe and degrading conditions – often 12 to 16 hours per day, six days a week – for extremely low wages, far below the national minimum wage, and further reduced by various deductions.
Those who refuse to work face reprisals or disciplinary sanctions, including fines or placement in solitary confinement. Such punishments can result in further consequences such as denial of parole or sentence commutation, as well as the loss of family visits.
Furthermore, prisoners are denied the right to unionise or strike to challenge their working conditions, and there are no effective complaint mechanisms or independent systems of oversight.
EPLN and Public Verdict urge the Committee to call on the Russian authorities to:
- Abolish forced labour and ensure prison work is safe, fairly paid, and voluntary;
- Allow prisoners to join unions;
- Guarantee prisoners free and prompt access to effective complaint and redress mechanisms for issues relating to their working conditions, without risk of retaliation.
RECRUITMENT OF PRISONERS FOR WAR
In a separate submission, EPLN highlighted the massive recruitment of prisoners into the Russian armed forces and their deployment to combat zones in Ukraine, where widespread war crimes are taking place.
This recruitment, which has already involved tens of thousands of prisoners, exploits the extreme vulnerability and complete dependence of the Russian prison population. In many cases, it has been established that prisoners had no choice but to accept recruitment. Overall, the recruitment process as it operates in Russian prisons does not allow for free and informed choice.
This practice amounts to “predatory recruitment” and violates the prohibition on slavery and forced labour. Furthermore, the recruitment policy runs completely counter to the penological objectives of punishment, as enshrined in international law and Russian law. Recruited prisoners are placed in an environment that fosters and normalises extreme violence, exposing them to situations where they may become complicit in, or direct perpetrators of, war crimes. The long-term consequences of such involvement include profound psychological harm and a loss of social reintegration prospects.
EPLN calls on the Committee to:
- condemn the forced recruitment of prisoners for war and
- urge the Russian authorities to end this practice.