AFP, Sochi :
The International Olympic Committee on Saturday said that it believed the jailing of a Russian activist who criticised the environmental damage from Sochi 2014 was not related to the Games.
A Russian court on Wednesday ordered Yevgeny Vitishko to serve a three-year sentence in a penal colony, a move that rights groups slammed as a bid to muzzle a leading critic of the Sochi Games.
The IOC had said this week that it was seeking clarification from the Russian authorities about the issue.
But IOC spokesman Mark Adams said Saturday that after receiving information from the Russian authorities it is now understood that Vitishko’s jailing was not related to the Olympics.
“This is not Games related,” Adams told reporters.
Adams said that the IOC had previously got action from Russia on several Games-related issues-including the re- location of people affected by Olympic construction, workers’ unpaid wages, and on the village Akhshtyr which was cut off by construction.
But he implied that the IOC would take no further action on the Vitishko case.
“We raised those and we got action on those ones. On this particular one, we don’t think that (it is Games related), we have been assured it is not Games related,” he said.
Vitishko was convicted in 2012 of damaging a fence during a protest against the construction of what activists believe is a mansion for the region’s governor in a public forest.
He received a three-year suspended sentence. But he has now been ordered to serve that term in a penal colony after breaking the terms of the original sentence.
Human Rights Watch this week said his conviction was “politically motivated from the start” and a bid to silence a persistent critic of the Sochi Games.
But Adams said: “We understand that Mr Vitishko was arrested after painting a house, vandalising a house.
“He was given a suspended sentence at the time. My understanding is that he broke that suspended sentence and subsequently jailed.
“Our understanding is that it is not Games related.”
Vitishko and his group Environmental Watch on the North Caucasus (EWNC) have repeatedly highlighted the damage of the Games construction on what was once a pristine environment.
The Russian authorities claim everything has been done to minimise the environmental impact of Sochi 2014 and have boasted of new areas created to compensate for any losses.
