U.S. protests basketball star Griner's move to Russian penal colony - Reuters

WASHINGTON, Nov 9 (Reuters) - Russian authorities past week transferred U.S. hoops prima Brittney Griner from a detention centre extracurricular Moscow and she is present connected her mode to an undisclosed penal colony, her ineligible squad and Washington's apical diplomat said connected Wednesday.

The two-time Olympic golden medallist was arrested connected Feb. 17 - a week earlier Russia invaded Ukraine - astatine a Moscow airport, wherever she was recovered to person vape cartridges containing cannabis oil, which is banned successful Russia, successful her luggage.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken successful a connection connected Wednesday said Griner was being transferred to a "remote penal colony" and that the United States expects Russian authorities to supply its embassy officials with entree to Griner and different Americans detained successful Russia.

"We powerfully protestation the question of Brittney Griner to a distant penal colony and the Russian government's usage of wrongful detentions," Blinken said successful a abstracted station connected Twitter.

The Women's National Basketball Players Association, successful a statement, said it was "crushed" by the move, calling it a "scary, seemingly never-ending nightmare," adding "the deficiency of clarity and transparency successful the process compounds the pain."

Griner, 32, was sentenced connected Aug. 4 to 9 years successful a penal colony connected charges of possessing and smuggling drugs. She had pleaded guilty, but said she had made an "honest mistake" and had not meant to interruption the law.

She was transferred from a detention halfway adjacent the Russian superior connected Nov. 4 successful bid to beryllium taken to a penal colony, but neither her existent determination nor her last destination are known, her ineligible squad said successful a statement.

In enactment with Russian procedures, they said her attorneys and the U.S. Embassy should beryllium notified upon her arrival, but that it would instrumentality up to 2 weeks for that to happen.

Russia did not notify the United States that Griner was being moved, according to a elder State Department official, who spoke connected information of anonymity.

Reuters has requested remark from Russia's national situation work connected wherever Griner is being taken and wherever she is now.

Transfers to penal colonies tin beryllium time-consuming arsenic groups of prisoners are assembled and moved to antithetic locations crossed the world's largest country.

U.S. President Joe Biden has directed his medication to "prevail connected her Russian captors to amended her attraction and the conditions she whitethorn beryllium forced to endure successful a penal colony."

The Biden medication successful precocious July projected a captive swap with Russia to unafraid Griner's release, arsenic good arsenic that of erstwhile U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, but said Moscow had yet to respond positively to the offer.

Russia has refused to remark connected the authorities of negotiations, saying specified diplomacy should not beryllium conducted successful public.

The souring of ties betwixt Russia and the West implicit the warfare successful Ukraine has analyzable the talks.

"Despite a deficiency of good-faith dialog by the Russians, the U.S. authorities has continued to travel up connected that connection and suggest alternate imaginable ways guardant with the Russians done each disposable channels," White House spokeswoman Karinne Jean-Pierre said.

Discussions implicit the projected swap person "not been a static process," the elder State Department authoritative added.

Griner's lawyers person not yet said if they volition effort a further entreaty against her condemnation aft a Russian tribunal rejected an attempted entreaty connected Oct. 25.

HARSH CONDITIONS

Inmates successful Russian penal colonies face a harsh regime of tedious manual work, mediocre hygiene and deficiency of capable entree to aesculapian care.

Maria Alyokhina, who served astir 2 years for her portion successful a 2012 punk protestation successful a Moscow cathedral by feminist radical Pussy Riot, told Reuters successful an interrogation past week she had been 1 of 80 women sleeping successful 1 country with conscionable 3 toilets and nary blistery water. She compared conditions to a Gulag labour camp nether Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

"Our superior interest continues to beryllium BG's wellness and well-being," Griner's agent, Lindsay Colas, said successful a abstracted statement, referring to the subordinate by her initials.

"As we enactment done this precise hard signifier of not knowing precisely wherever BG is oregon however she is doing, we inquire for the public's enactment successful continuing to constitute letters and explicit their emotion and attraction for her," Colas said.

Additional reporting by Mark Trevelyan, Filipp Lebedev, Doina Chiacu and Susan Heavey; Editing by Andrew Osborn, Paul Simao and Jonathan Oatis

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