Ben Stewart - Don't Trust, Don't Fear, Don't Beg

21st October

Still trying to establish what that huge mallet is for. The guards turn up each morning with it but God knows how you’d have room to swing it in a cell. I’m still greeting them with a brisk Good Morning when the cell door opens and we get marched outside for inspection. Yuri says I’m starting to look thin and a bit gaunt. Well there’s a surprise! I like him though. He has got a real spark of life in him. He was so dumbfounded when I beat him at chess last night.

By now all the crew have radios and televisions in their cells. The radio plays soft rock classics, nothing to stir the blood, but the jingle soon feels familiar, even comforting – a glockenspiel playing the first few bars of ‘Midnight in Moscow’ by Kenny Ball. On their TV sets they watch euronews and the music channels, and sometimes Russian state TV.

There are three kinds of programmes. Documentaries about the FSB raiding someone, films about the FSB raiding someone, and soap operas about the FSB raiding someone. Frank sits for hours staring at the screen, flicking from channel to channel, watching uniformed officers bashing down doors in towns and cities across Russia, just like a young Vladimir Putin once did. He sees what’s happening here. It’s being reinforced all the time, how there are bad people out there and the state will protect you.

Camila is watching euronews when she sees video footage of the protest at the Prirazlomnaya . The voiceover is in Russian and she can hear the word ‘ hooliganski ’ repeated over and over. Then, rolling across the bottom of the screen in English, she sees the news ticker.

Camila’s heart jumps. She grabs her spoon and drops onto her knees in front of the radiator pipe. In the cell next door Alex is woken by manic tapping. Sini hears it too.

Camila: turn on euronews

Alex: why?

Camila: turn on euronews

Alex: wow

Camila: piracy dropped

Alex: means they can’t keep us in here

Camila: amazing

Alex: no reason to keep us in here

Sini: careful don’t get hopes up now charged with hooliganism

Alex: sure?

Sini: hooliganski means hooligan

Alex: they can’t hold us in here for that

Sini: they can

Alex: not as bad as piracy

Sini: could be worse

For a moment Alex and Camila thought they were getting out, but soon enough Sini convinces them this could actually be worse. They’re moving from the pantomime charge of piracy to something that might stand up in the court of global public opinion. Alex wraps herself in her purple ski jacket and hugs herself.

Across SIZO-1 the activists are reaching the same conclusion. That night the road buzzes with discussion and analysis. Hooliganism carries seven years in jail. Nearly everybody thinks the change of charge is bad news. They fear they’re being set up to get screwed by the Russian courts. Phil sits down on his bunk and writes an open letter, and the next morning he hands it to Mr Babinski.

Why I’m not a hooligan, by Phil Ball, aged 42½…

Now we, the ‘Arctic 30’, face the charge of hooliganism. At first, it sounds only a bit more serious than naughty rascal or cheeky monkey. Something must be lost in the translation because seven years in prison seems a bit harsh. My sons, aged seven and nine, will be teenagers and my little girl will have forgotten who I am if I get out of here in seven years. Pretty unfunny too.

The small print of the charge says that hooliganism is a ‘gross violation of public order’ and ‘in contempt of society’. Well, hang on just a moment: ‘contempt of society’? I give blood; volunteer at my local scout group; pick up dog poo off the playing field and I don’t have a dog; went to court as a witness to two violent crimes; helped fight a supermarket development; have taught kids to make award-winning films; have worked on projects for the Stop Aids foundation and the RSPB [Royal Society for the Protection of Birds]; invested £1,000 of my own money to help set up a community wind farm co-operative; and once saved and hand-reared a pigeon called Gerald. But the biggest thing I’ve done in support and protection of society? Coming 180 nautical miles north of the Arctic Circle to protest against Arctic oil drilling, against the greedy mega-rich oil companies Gazprom, Shell and others that do not listen to the warnings about oil spills, runaway climate change, hurricanes, droughts, floods and famines, and continue to make a fortune at the expense of and ‘in contempt of’ the societies of our children and grandchildren.

Hooliganism doesn’t even come close to what they are guilty of. So, no, I’m not a pirate and I’m not a hooligan. OK? Can I come home now?

Phil Ball – father of three cheeky monkeys and one of the Arctic 30

24th October

Just saw local news item informing that piracy law has been dropped but replaced with hooliganism law that covers 0–7 years as opposed to 10–15 for piracy. Shortly after that our cell had a visit from 9 officers, 1 interpreter and a prosecutor. They claimed my pictures of Nell, Joe, Pluto and Free Frank protest contravened several sections of the prison code as they had been stuck on the wall by my bed. There was a tense stand-off as they repeated the infringements and I was surrounded by 9 screws with Boris and Yuri standing behind me. It was a potentially dangerous moment where I could feel my emotions rising fast. I eventually bowed my head and agreed. They slowly walked out one by one without saying a word. It was awful. I looked back up at Nell and Joe and slowly climbed onto my bunk and removed them with as much care as possible to avoid damage. It was quiet. Boris and Yuri looked down at the floor. Then thank God Yuri looked at me very closely and said, ‘Frank, game chess??’ He read the situation perfectly. Not forgetting that he is looking at 5–7 years inside.

Dima has visitors. Two men in sharp suits, not the cheap acrylic type worn by the investigators at the local FSB headquarters in town.

They’re standing in the middle of his cell, examining the contents of his shelves and the bags of food piled up in the corner, at the peeling green paint and the small barred window. Dima is watching them from his bunk. He doesn’t know who they are, but he’s been in jail long enough to know they’re trouble. Thirty seconds ago they opened the door and walked in unannounced. No greetings and no orders. Instead they merely closed the cell door and each took a step forward then put their hands on their hips.

Both guys are in their mid to late thirties. One is spindly thin. He has greasy hair that’s parted in the middle and sticks to his forehead, small red shaving spots speckle his neck, two deep crevices cut their way from his nostrils to his jaw, above which stand two bony cheeks that collapse into his mouth. Surrounding his thin lips are a few wispy whiskers – a failed attempt at a goatee beard, perhaps? He looks a little like a giant emaciated gerbil. The other guy is carrying some weight, sandpaper stubble, a thick helmet of brown hair that’s cut along a savagely straight fringe.

The men ignore the Russian prisoners and walk over to Dima’s bed. Gerbil kicks the leg of the bunk. It makes a metallic rattle.

‘Dimitri Litvinov?’

Dima sits up. ‘Can I help you?’

‘Come with us, please.’

Dima rubs his greying beard and eyes the men suspiciously. Then he swings his legs over and jumps down.

He’s taken from his cell to a small room containing a desk, three chairs and a huge portrait of Putin. One of the men locks the door, Dima is told to take a seat. The men sit opposite him. Dima’s heart is beating fast now. They’re quite obviously senior FSB officers, probably up from St Petersburg. Today has already seen a march in Moscow demanding the release of political prisoners. Twenty thousand attended – a huge number for a protest in Russia, where demonstrators can be plucked off the street and thrown in jail by a political police force empowered to act with impunity in defence of the President’s agenda. One of the columns on the march was dedicated to imprisoned environmentalists, with the focus on the Arctic 30. There was a fleeting, dismissive reference to the protest on the TV news. Is this what the men want to talk about?