Russian teenager jailed for terrorism complains of beatings in detention

Arseny Turbin, a Russian teenager serving a five-year prison term for terrorism, has spoken of being beaten while in detention in a letter to his mother, the Free Arseny Telegram channel set up to support him wrote on Monday.

Turbin wrote that his cellmate had punched him in the head on 1 October at the detention centre in Moscow where he is currently being held. He said it was not the first time he had been beaten.

“The situation is very hard. My cellmate punched me and said that I’d get it tonight too. It’ll be very hard, but I’ll cope. It’s happened before. I had a hard night on 15 July too, but I survived, and in the morning we were moved apart,” Turbin wrote to his mother.

Turbin also wrote that the detention centre had registered him as “prone to terrorism” due to the charges for which he was convicted and imprisoned. Those close to Turbin fear this may lead to him being deprived of food. The support page urged people to write letters to him.

A military court sentenced the then 15-year-old Turbin to five years in prison for involvement with a terrorist organisation on 20 June. The investigation asserted that in the summer of 2023, Turbin had joined the Freedom of Russia Legion and had posted leaflets critical of Vladimir Putin in local people’s mailboxes on behalf of the organisation. The legion fights alongside the Armed Forces of Ukraine against the Russian military in the war in Ukraine, and has been designated a terrorist organisation in Russia.

Independent news outlet Mediazona subsequently revealed that security forces had falsified the report of their interview with Turbin, which was then used to open a criminal case against him.