Many of you will have seen the story in which Paul spoke with ABC. It surfaced many new details, unknown to our family, and makes even clearer what a completely bogus case Russian authorities fabricated. Paul left a voice mail message with our parents yesterday that the sleep deprivation continues. The US Embassy submitted a diplomatic note to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs weeks ago as well as calling the prison but were ignored by both. We are grateful for the Embassy's public advocacy on Paul's behalf, tweeted on Wednesday [11/10/2020].

The long reach of the false prosecution extends to Mordovia, where Paul is labeled as a flight risk. Russian media report that this designation is at the prosecutor's request and is the cause of this human rights abuse. Russian media reported that Paul had not complained to the human rights Public Monitoring Committee (ОНК) about this previously. But no-one in Russia has denied the abuse and the warden certainly knew of it. His staff were going to Paul's bunk every two hours during the night and throwing off his blankets [Interfax A, below]. Paul had complained to the staff and asked the warden for an explanation but was also ignored.

We appreciate the OHK representative, Valery Krutov, finding the time to visit Paul [11/13/2020?]. The prison warden appears to have assured them that his staff will stop violating the 6-hour minimum human rights-mandated sleep for prisoners, in Paul's case at least. Paul has repeated his request to be able to speak to an English-speaking doctor, a request he has repeated for more than 18 months. [Interfax B, below] Свиньи могут летать.

Paul has been in Russian detention for nearly 2 years. The US Embassy stated yesterday in its tweet that "[t]he US will not sit quietly". So far, the only people not sitting quietly are all in Russia. We are grateful for the Public Monitoring Committee's oversight, both in Lefortovo and Mordovia. And the U.S. Embassy remains Paul's most stalwart advocate.

We hope that Secretary Pompeo and his staff, the NSC, the administration, and Congress, won't continue to sit quietly as we approach the 2-year mark in Paul Whelan's wrongful detention.

[ABC story: https://abcnews.go.com/International/marine-paul-whelan-speaks-russian-prison-abc-news/story?id=74103250 ]
[US Embassy tweet: https://twitter.com/USEmbRuPress/status/1326856405727522818 ]
[Interfax interview A with Valery Krutov (sleep): https://www.interfax-russia.ru/volga/main/rukovodstvo-kolonii-gde-soderzhitsya-uilan-obeshchaet-ne-sozdavat-emu-problem-so-snom-onk-1 ]
[Interfax interview B with Valery Krutov (doctor): https://www.interfax-russia.ru/volga/news/osuzhdennyy-v-rf-za-shpionazh-amerikanec-uilan-prosit-vracha-so-znaniem-angliyskogo-yazyka-onk ]
[RIA/N story elaborates on the aforementioned: https://ria.ru/20201113/koloniya-1584484801.html ]