We have written several times about the heroic activities of human rights defender Vladimir Osechkin and former prisoner Sergei Saveliev, who joined him in their fight against the torture system in Russian pre-trial detention centers and prisons in general, as well as their reporting on the issue of torture against Muslims there (https://golosislama.com/news.php?id=40230).
The bad news (although what could be worse than the fact that the information is being suppressed?!) is that in any normal, living country, the disclosure of such information would have led to mass protests and the removal of the existing government, as it once happened in Georgia. And since nothing of the sort happened in Russia, it can be considered a country that is, if not dead, at least in a state of lethargic sleep.
The good news is that after initiating the case against Saveliev for revealing official secrets (!!!) and declaring Osechkin wanted, the authorities were forced to react to the facts they were voicing. Let’s be honest — they were forced not because of the reaction of the Russian people, which was practically non-existent («the people remain silent»), but rather because of the resonance caused by dozens of publications on this topic in the international media, organized by Osechkin and Saveliev, who are based in the EU.
Last week, Vladimir Putin, by decree, removed Lieutenant General of the Federal Security Service (FSB) Alexander Kalashnikov from the position of Director of the Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) of Russia. Commenting on this decision, Dmitry Peskov said that it was not related to Osechkin’s revelations and that the initiative for the resignation came from Kalashnikov himself. However, the removal of officials from their positions, investigations and criminal cases against the leadership of the torture facilities, which were specifically mentioned in Osechkin’s materials based on the archive provided to him by the programmer Saveliev, indicate otherwise. For example, criminal cases were opened against the leadership and participants of the torture unit disguised as the tuberculosis prison hospital — OTB-1 SIZO-1 in the Saratov region, and key figures, including the head, Pavel Gatsenko, were taken into custody. This is what Osechkin himself writes about it.