Siberian Shaman Gives Up Anti-Putin Crusade

A Siberian shaman who made national headlines for attempting to trek to Moscow and "cast out" Putin from power won't restart his journey, he said after being discharged from the mental asylum he was forced into earlier this year.

In a statement carried by local media, Alexander Gabyshev said he wishes to focus on his health and personal life.

"In order to get my health in order, I have to live on my own now. I think you will understand my decision," he said. "I'll take care of my teeth, get my documents in order and think about working in the future."

Gabyshev first set out from his home in the republic of Sakha last year, planning to trek over 8,000 kilometers to Moscow before performing a ritual to "banish" Putin from the Kremlin.

He dragged a cart carrying his belongings along highways, gathering a small following and meeting supporters in cities he passed.

He and his supporters were detained several times, forcing the shaman to restart his journey from his home city of Yakutsk each time.

Authorities in Yakutsk placed him in a mental asylum in June after he announced a third attempt to trek to Moscow, a move condemned by rights groups as an attempt to silence a dissenter and compared to Soviet-era punitive psychiatry.

"To the many people who supported me mentally and supplied me with food and clothing ... I express my gratitude and sincere goodwill. And now, without losing heart, we need to live like human beings," he said in his statement.

Hydropanels Bring Water to Navajo Nation

In the Navajo Nation, sometimes a single spigot on an empty road is the only water source around for hundreds of residents. Others have to drive from their rural homes into towns miles away to buy all the water they need for cooking, drinking, cleaning, and livestock, because there's no infrastructure to bring it through pipes. About 40% of households in the Navajo Nation live without running water. But now, at a few houses, panels positioned on the ground pull moisture from the air, connecting to a tap inside the home and providing up to 10 liters of water -- or about 20 16-ounce bottles -- a day, at no cost to the family.

The panels come from Zero Mass Water; the company's Source hydropanels use sunlight to absorb water vapor from the air, even in arid climates. Zero Mass Water partnered with local Navajo governments and Navajo Power, a public benefit corporation working to install solar panels on tribal lands, for an initial demonstration project in which 15 homes received two Source panels each, for a total of 30 panels. Those initial panels were funded by Barclays and The Unreasonable Group, an accelerator for socially minded startups.

Each Source hydropanel can make up to 3 to 5 liters of water a day; with two panels, a home can get up to 10 liters a day, and each panel can store 30 liters of water, or 60 16-ounce bottles of water, for when cloud cover may affect production. The panels last for 15 years.

The Navajo Nation has at points during the pandemic had the highest COVID-19 infection rate per capita in the U.S., worsened by the fact that residents can't easily access water to wash their hands and have to make frequent trips into town to buy water. Zero Mass Water first started communicating with the Navajo Nation about three years ago, but the pandemic has heightened the urgency for this partnership. The company worked with chapter leaders -- the Navajo Nation has 110 chapters, which are geographical divisions like counties -- to find the people most in need.