Longest-held Russian dissident freed in swap says ‘colors get brighter by the day’ in his new life

BY  DASHA LITVINOVA

BERLIN (AP) — Andrei Pivovarov knows there are about 1,000 hours in 42 days.

Doing the math in his head and quietly marking milestones left in his sentence helped the Russian opposition politician survive more than three years in prison, much of it spent in complete isolation.

“You have no one to talk to, so you come up with causes” for celebration, Pivovarov said in an interview with The Associated Press. A scrap of a letter from his wife fashioned into a bookmark also became precious to him.

Freed on Aug. 1 in the historic East-West prisoner swap, Pivovarov now is figuring out a new life in Germany, where he reunited with his wife, Tatyana Usmanova.

Of all the dissidents Russia released, Pivovarov, 42, spent the most time behind bars. He had only about a month left to serve when he was plucked from the prison in