Russian Volunteer Corps reveals it planned to rescue Navalny from prison late last year

The Russian Volunteer Corps (RVC), a Russian paramilitary unit fighting alongside the Ukrainian Armed Forces, has revealed it planned to rescue Alexey Navalny from his penal colony in central Russia in October.

The group said it had made contact with “interested” employees of Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) who had provided them with surveillance footage, details on daily routine in the colony and transcripts of Navalny’s conversations with his fellow inmates.

The plan, codenamed Operation December, was to free Navalny, get him to the Ukrainian border and hand him over to an RVC intelligence unit. The group’s commander said that the plan had been to rescue Navalny during his transfer to the IK-3 penal colony in the Yamalo-Nenets autonomous district in the Russian Arctic.

“Unfortunately, the security measures taken by FSIN and the Federal Security Service to prevent such scenarios proved very effective. … The time and date were put back several times, and it went ahead without much warning on direct orders from FSIN, meaning our group didn’t have the time to get to the location of the planned operation,” he said.

He said the group had been repurposing its plan for use at the IK-3 penal colony when it was announced that Navalny was dead.

Stressing that it was prepared to work with other organisations in fighting the criminal regime in the Kremlin, the RVC pledged to continue its efforts to bring about the release of other political prisoners in Russia however it could. 

The RVC has published data and photographic materials it received in the planning phase as proof of its intent. This included diagrams of the colony, information on staff numbers and surveillance camera footage.

Navalny’s conversation with a fellow prisoner

The RVC also published a transcript of what it says is a conversation between Navalny and a fellow prisoner, nicknamed Filozop, where Navalny asked how things worked at the colony and said he knew and understood that the prisoner had been given specific instructions on how to deal with him.

The RVC said it would continue to work to release other political prisoners and prisoners of conscience from the regime’s clutches however it could and that it was ready to work with other organisations fighting against the criminal regime in the Kremlin.