The Russian Metallurgical District Court of the city of Chelyabinsk has denied the request for the release of political prisoner Tofik Abdulgaziev due to his health condition.
We would like to remind that Tofik Abdulgaziev was detained in the occupied Crimea back on 27 March 2019. He was accused of participation in the activities of organisation ‘Hizb ut-Tahrir’ and on 12 May 2022 in Rostov-on-Don, the Southern District Military Court sentenced Abdulgaziev to 12 years of imprisonment in a strict regime colony, first 5 years of which in prison and restriction of freedom for a year after release.
During all this time, due to inadequate conditions of detention in places of detention, due to systematic ignoring of complaints about his well-being, due to inadequate and untimely medical care, Tofik Abdulgaziev’s health condition deteriorated significantly. Thus, he was diagnosed with tuberculosis and bilateral pneumonia, and he lost almost 40 kilograms.
The political prisoner’s wife Alie noted that her husband’s health condition continues to deteriorate rapidly, but the Russians pay no attention to it.
‘We knocked on all doors, shouted to the whole world that the Crimean Tatar is rapidly fading away. But it turned out that in a world where at least a piece of paper used to be decisive, now documents with a wet stamp mean nothing. Medical reports confirming the presence of diseases that are included (by law!) in the list of incompatible with the conditions of imprisonment have turned into a flop,’ – she said.
And to the argument that Tofik Abdulgaziev lost almost 40 kilograms Judge Kalashnikov replied that he ‘is not in a sanatorium’.
The CTRC team once again emphasises that by these actions the Russian Federation violates the right of a political prisoner to the highest attainable level of physical and mental health. Moreover, according to the legislation of the Russian Federation, seriously ill people should be released from detention, as human life is the highest value, the sentence should not become a death sentence.
We demand that the Russian Federation immediately release Tofik Abdulgaziev and all other political prisoners, as well as stop the systematic violation of human rights in the occupied Crimea.