Ukrainian film director Oleh Sentsov, currently in a Russian jail in Siberia, has refused to work at the penal colony where he is held. Sentsov is instead engaged in creative work and is ready to ask for a pardon,” his lawyer Dmitry Dinze has said.
“He is being held alone – alone. No one is in contact with him. He is writing a scenario. He is involved in creative work and refuses to work for the penal colony. He is working for himself and waiting to be freed. They offered him work at the prison’s film studio or in the prison kitchen, easy jobs for those who cooperate with the prison administration,” Dinze said in an interview with the U.S. government funded Radio Free Liberty/Radio Europe media network.
Dinze said Sentsov is being held in a regular prison barracks with 30-40 convicts, who have “very good” relations with him. The lawyer said Sentsov has no conflicts with the other prisoners.
As earlier reported, the North Caucasus Military Court in Rostov-on-Don ruled in August 2015 to sentence Sentsov, who had been detained in Crimea in 2014, to 20 years in a high-security penitentiary on charges of setting up a terrorist group in Crimea.
Sentsov is reportedly serving his sentence in high-security correctional facility number eight (also dubbed Polar Bear) is located just outside the Yamalo-Nenets town of Labytnangi. Its inmates are male convicts sentenced for serious and very serious crimes.
The Ukrainian authorities have repeatedly called the Sentsov case politically motivated. In May 2016, he filled out documents for a transfer to Ukraine to serve his term there. The Russian Supreme Court declined to review his appeal. The Ukrainian Justice Ministry said in fall 2016 that Russia had refused to extradite the Ukrainian.
