Russia plans to use prison labor for 2018 World Cup

Russian authorities want to use prison labor to drive down the costs of holding the 2018 World Cup. The Russian prison service is backing a bid by Alexander Khinshtein, a lawmaker from the ruling United Russia party, to allow prisoners to be taken from their camps to work at factories, with a focus on driving down the costs of building materials for World Cup projects. Russian prison labor schemes have faced allegations that prisoners are routinely underpaid or forced to work long hours. In 2013, the then-imprisoned Pussy Riot band member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova went on hunger strike in protest at working conditions in her prison camp.

The agency was keen to use prisoners for tasks that, let’s say, wouldn’t appeal to the ordinary citizen.

Deputy director Alexander Rudy told the Kommersant business newspaper

Russia’s move toward prison labor comes at a time when the World Cup budget of 637.6 billion rubles ($12.7 billion) is under pressure after the ruble dropped in value compared to last year, making imported materials more expensive. The ruble has recovered much of its lost value this year, but is still worth around a third less against the dollar than at the start of 2014, before international sanctions and a drop in the price of oil dented the Russian economy.

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