Russia claims to know nothing about Alexei Navalny, a critic of Putin who is “missing.”

According to Al Jazeera, the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is imprisoned and has apparently been absent from prison since December 6. The Kremlin has said that it has “no information” on Navalny.

Since December 6, Navalny has not been accessible to his attorneys.

He was spending his term in a penitentiary colony for a number of offenses, including extremism. The prison administration relocated him, but they have not disclosed to what location he was taken to.

Navalny had left the IK-6 facility in the town of Melekhovo in the Vladimir region, approximately 230 km (140 miles) east of Moscow, prison officials informed a court on Friday (local time). This information was reported by Al Jazeera, citing Vyacheslav Gimadi, the head of the legal department at Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation.

When questioned about the Kremlin’s knowledge of Navalny, spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, “No. I’ll say it again: we lack the ability, the right, or the inclination to follow the lives of inmates serving court-ordered terms.”

According to Al Jazeera, Navalny, who gained notoriety by criticizing President Vladimir Putin’s “elite” and accusing “extensive corruption,” was given a 19-year jail term in August, on top of the 11 and a half years he had previously been serving.

For the tenth day, we don’t know [where he is],” Navalny’s attorney wrote on X.

Before he was transferred, the opponents of Putin had been preparing for his anticipated transfer to a high-security “special regime” facility, the worst classification in Russia’s jail system.

Navalny’s spokesperson, Kira Yarmysh, said on X, “Where he was taken is not known,” indicating that he was relocated on December 11. “Let me remind you that the lawyers have not seen Alexei since December 6.”

See | Vladimir Putin’s detractors When there is a court hearing, Navalny won’t come out of his cell.
Navalny’s team had earlier claimed that the Russian leader, who was imprisoned, had a catastrophic health issue.

Maria Pevchikh, a different supporter of Navalny, has meanwhile asked the UN Human Rights Committee to assist in finding the leader who is imprisoned.

In actuality, Alexei’s situation is one of severe human rights violations and forced abduction. We need to provide answers,” she said on Thursday.

A number of human rights organizations have also commented on Moscow’s criticism. “The possibility that he may be in transit to another prison colony” was accepted by Amnesty International.

“As if attempted poisoning, imprisonment and inhumane conditions of detention were not enough, Alexei Navalny may now have been subjected to an enforced disappearance,” it said.

2020 saw the dissident transported from Russia to Germany after being exposed to the nerve toxin Novichok, which was used in the Soviet Union. According to CNN, Navalny had to be flown from the Siberian city of Omsk and was found unconscious at a Berlin hospital.

When Navalny returned to Russia in January 2021, he was immediately placed under arrest on accusations that he had broken his probation in connection with a 2013 fraud case that he had also denied having been launched against him for political reasons.

Additionally, he has spoken against Russia’s war against Ukraine while incarcerated and has even made an effort to organize public resistance to the conflict.

As per CNN, throughout Putin’s almost two-decade tenure, Navalny represented one of the gravest challenges to his legitimacy.

Following his August sentencing to 19 years in a maximum-security prison colony, Navalny said that “the number of years does not matter.”