If IKEA has left Russia due to the invasion of Ukraine and sanctions, the prisoners will take care of building furniture at affordable prices. State and municipal companies have signed a 600 million rubles ($ 10 million) contract with the criminal colonies of the Ural region for furniture production, writes the local Oblastnaya Gazeta newspaper, relaunched by the Moscow Times.
“The penal colonies could take the place of Ikea. If we compare the furniture, the quality is better and the prices are lower,” said Ivan Sharkov, head of the prison work program in the Sverdlosk region. The Swedish furniture giant is one of hundreds of Western companies that have closed their doors in Russia as part of Western sanctions for the attack on Ukraine.
Russian authorities recently extended prison work programs, also to address a labor shortage, writes Moscow Times, recalling that in February the federal prison service announced the creation of correctional centers for first-time sentences or perpetrators. of minor offenses. At the time, the intention of rebuilding the labor camps of the Soviet-era gulag system was denied.
“They will not be gulags, they will have new and decent conditions”, assured the then head of the prison system, Alexander Kalashnikov. At a recent fair in Yekaterinburg, in the Urals, goods worth 3.5 million rubles ($ 58,000) produced in 30 prisons in seven Russian regions were put up for sale. However, it is not clear what working conditions are imposed on prisoners.
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