Presumed member of Hizb ut-Tahrir's Yalta cell ends his 23-day hunger strike in Rostov-on-Don
ROSTOV-ON-DON. July 24 (Interfax) - Emir-Usein Kuku, who is suspected of involvement in Hizb ut-Tahrir terrorist organization (banned in Russia) and is being held in a pre-trial detention facility in Rostov-on-Don, has ended his hunger strike, Leonid Petrashis, the head of the Public Monitoring Commission for the Rostov region, told Interfax.
"He ended his hunger strike on Monday. Today we've been to the pre-trial detention facility No. 4 and talked to him. I believe Emir-Usein Kuku's goal was to attract attention and he thinks he succeeded in that. He believes his demands were heard. He is alone in his cell now; he eats nutritional mixtures and drinks juices. He has no complaints about the detention facility and he is in satisfactory condition," Petrashis said.
On June 26, 2018, Kuko, who is being held in the pre-trial detention facility No. 4 in Rostov-on-Don, notified the management of the institution in a written form that he had gone on a hunger strike demanding that Ukrainian citizens be released from Russian prisons. At that he pointed out that he does not have complaints about his incarceration conditions at the pre-trial detention facility.
Anatoly Kharkovsky, the human rights commissioner for the Rostov region, said several days ago that medics assessed Kuku's condition as satisfactory. However, his lawyer Sergei Loktev said that his client's health has deteriorated due to the ongoing hunger strike.
As reported, six defendants charged with establishing a Hizb ut-Tahrir cell in Yalta aiming at a violent government overthrow pleaded not guilty at the hearing. Kuku was one of them.