Putin’s War in Ukraine Far from Only Reason Russia’s Prison Population is Declining and Penal Institutions are Closing, ‘Important Stories’ Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, July 9 – It is widely believed that the number of those incarcerated for crimes in Russia has fallen because inmates have been given the opportunity to fight in Putin’s war in Ukraine and that their departure is why almost 90 penal institutions have been closed since February 2022.

            That is part of the explanation, Important Stories journalist Alina Danilina says; but it is only part of it. Other reasons include a growing shortage of guards who may very well have gone to war as a better alternative to their jobs and the sentencing of those convicted not to prison (istories.media/stories/2025/07/08/v-rossii-za-35-goda-zakrili-pochti-90-kolonii-i-sizo-eto-iz-za-voini/).

            She acknowledges that fulling proving her argument is impossible because Moscow has stopped publishing reliable data on the number of convicts and the shortages of guards, although there have been enough statements by officials and analyses by experts to show that the war itself is not the only cause.

            In support of her own argument, Danilina points out that slightly more Russian penal institutions were closed in the three and a half years before Putin launched his expanded invasion of Ukraine than in the three and a half since and that the challenge of trying to hire more guards has become ever more lively.

            She also points out that the system is not becoming more humane and that the shortage of guards almost certainly means that in many cases, Russian prisoners who remain behind bars or in the camps are being treated even worse than they were before 2022 given that the remaining guards are more likely to use force than when there was a larger number of them.