‘This isn’t staged footage’: Committee Against Torture chairman Igor Kalyapin answers Meduza’s questions about the rampant abuse in Russian prisons

In early October, the human rights group Gulagu.net (Not to the Gulag) released several video clips that show incidents of physical and sexual abuse in Russian prisons. According to the Gulagu.net founder Vladimir Osechkin, these videos were just a fraction of a 40-gigabyte "archive" leaked to human rights activists by a former inmate (apparently the group has received more videos since then). Though prisoners themselves are sometimes involved in committing these abuses, Osechkin believes that this is part of a single, centralized system created with the knowledge of Russia's prison authority (the Federal Penitentiary Service or FSIN). For expert insight into what's fueling the rampant abuse in Russia's prison system, Meduza turned to Igor Kalyapin, the chairman of the Committee Against Torture. Original Article: https://meduza.io/en/feature/2021/10/13/this-isn-t-staged-footage