In Ingushetia, Relatives of Inmates Kept in Omsk Colony Complain of Cruel Treatment
Saiv Toshkhoev, a resident of Ingushetia, has stated, with reference to his brother Mikhail and his fellow countryman Islam Tsechoev, who serve their terms in the Omsk Region, that prisoners are violently brought to the medical-corrective establishment in Beregovoi settlement of the Russia’s Omsk Region, where they are tortured.
The “Kavkaz-Uzel” correspondent reports with reference to Toshkhoev that healthy inmates, who need no treatment, are brought there; they are scoffed, beaten and tortured there.
“I was a prisoner myself in due time, and I know, what mockeries are practiced in a colony. My brother is a first-time inmate; he was sentenced to 14 years, 8 of them he has already served. We could contact him until he was transferred to LIU-2 (treatment-corrective establishment), where AIDS patients are kept,” said Toshkhoev and added that in the establishment blood is taken from prisoners by means of dirty syringes, under risk of infection; patients are beaten and humiliated, and “forced to do things that we can’t do by virtue of our mentality.”
Alexander Stepanischev, assistant of the head of the UFSIN (Punishment Enforcement Service) for human rights, said that he was unaware of the above facts of cruel treatment. He also refuted the data that prisoners are under risk of AIDS infection.