SUFFRAGIST PRISONERS AND A RUSSIAN PRISON .

16 June 1913. PARLIAMENTARY  DEBATES. COMMONS.

SUFFRAGISTS PRISONERS (Tullamore Goal)

Mr. GINNELL asked the Chief secretary for Ireland why the three suffrage prisoners now in Tullamore Gaol are not allowed the privileges of a daily visit and a daily letter,in and out, hitherto allowed to political prisoners even when sentenced  to hard labour , which the present prisoners have not been; whether in resentment of this discrimination against them they now refuse to take food; and whether to avert a kind of struggle not wanted in Ireland he will have the restriction withdrawn and the privileges allowed as hitherto?

Mr. BIRRELL; The General Prisons Board inform me that the three prisoners referred to are not entitled to a daily visit and letter under the rules, but any application for special visits or letters if made to the Board in accordance with the Regulations will be duly considered.Any application of this kind made by them up to the present has, as a matter of fact, been granted by the Board in the exercise of its discretion.

100 YEARS ON.  23MAY 2013

HUNGER STRIKE FOR PUSSY RIOTER IN PAROLE ROW.

A member of the band Pussy Riot who was jailed over a protest against President Vladimir Putin in a Russian cathedral said yesterday she was starting a hunger strike after she was barred from a parole hearing.
Maria Alyokhina also told her lawyers to quit the proceedings.
She and bandmate Nadezhda Tolokonnikova are serving two year terms for bursting into Moscow's main Russian Orthodox cathedral in February 2012 and singing a profanity-laced "punk prayer" urging the Virgin Mary to "throw Putin out!"
  Speaking by a video link from prison, Alyokhina told the court considering her request for release on parole that it had violated her rights by not allowing her to take part.
   "In protest against the court's refusal to allow me to appear in person to take part in the hearing, I'm going on hunger strike ,"Alyokhina said.
 "In the current cicumstances I forbid all my lawyers and representatives to take part in this court hearing.