Lhe death of Alexei Navalny in the IK-3 colony of the Yamalo-Nenets autonomous district illustrates in a way that is both spectacular and odious the centrality of the prison system in the Russian repressive machine. The precise circumstances of the death of the main opponent of the Kremlin remain unknown, and there is doubly reason to believe that they will remain so: investigations concerning suspicious deaths in prison systematically come to naught in Russia; attacks committed against opposition figures benefit from broad impunity.
It is in any case established that prison techniques of annihilation were used against Alexeï Navalny, who suffered secret transfers, incessant disciplinary isolation, harassment of the caste of prisoners acquired by the administration, deprivation of sleep and medical care, formidable conditions of the Far North. The authorities have never taken the trouble to really deny the well-documented reports on the fate inflicted on the country’s best-known prisoner, a fate which could only slowly destroy a state of health already weakened by his poisoning in 2020.
An instrument of the regime’s dirty work when it comes to silencing the few dissenting political voices, the Russian penitentiary system is also a formidable machine for crushing the mass of litigants who are delivered to it daily. The management of detention is, in Russia, made of pure punitive logic and absolute subjection. The ordinary functioning of many establishments is governed by the threat of humiliation and degradation – frequently of a sexual nature, maintained by detachments of prisoners under orders from the administration.
Population marked by the use of criminal law
Repeatedly in recent years, the use of torture, sometimes on a large scale, has hit the headlines. In doing so, not only does prison break the individuals it detains, but it also acclimates society as a whole to state violence. This diffusion occurs all the more naturally as the population, historically marked by massive use of criminal justice, is particularly familiar with prison.
In this regard, it is certain that the non-commissioned soldiers who are guilty of abuse against the Ukrainian population, in addition to the fact that they have often been socialized to violence in their barracks, have an understanding of the normal functioning of institutions imbued with police operating methods. and penitentiary, especially since the army mainly welcomes habitual offenders. In this sense, prison is a real matrix of violence, and particularly of the culture of rape in society.
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