Detained Greenpeace activists are kept in police detention facilities in Murmansk region
MURMANSK. Sept 25 (Interfax) - The detained Greenpeace activists have been placed in the Murmansk region's temporary detention facilities, Irina Paikacheva, chairman of the public observer commission of the Murmansk region for the observance of human rights in detention facilities, told Interfax.
"Eight people are in the Leninsky district, nine are in the Oktyabrsky district, and the location of the others is currently unknown. We are looking for them," she said.
Members of the public observer commission intend to seek a meeting with the detainees who are in the temporary detention facility in the Leninsky district.
Ivan Blokov, programs director at Greenpeace Russia, told Interfax that the detainees "were sent to different detention facilities in different cities at night."
Vladimir Markin from the Investigations Committee said earlier on Wednesday that investigators are prosecuting the thirty Arctic Sunrise crewmembers over their attack on the Prirazlomnaya oilrig. Three of these people, who are Russian citizens, have been questioned, he said. The foreign citizens will be questioned without interpreters, Markin said.
Three lawyers hired by Greenpeace are actively expressing a wish to defend all detainees, "but the investigators cannot grant this request because, according to the Russian Code of Criminal Procedure, one person cannot defend two suspects or defendants if their interests conflict with each other."
On September 19, a special task unit of the Russian border guard service stormed the Greenpeace icebreaker Arctic Sunrise in the Pechora Sea for trying to hold a protest against oil extraction on the Prirazlomnaya oilrig. The vessel was escorted by border guards on its way to the port of Murmansk. The vessel and its crew of thirty, who are citizens of different countries, including four citizens of Russia, were taken to Murmansk.
