Nadya Tolokonnikova, 22, has been sent to Mordovia and Maria Alyokhina, 24, has been sent to Perm, according to their defense lawyer.

The Guardian notes that their relatives and lawyer don't yet know exactly which one of Russia's approximately 40 penal colonies for women they were sent to.

Both areas have Stalin-era prisons infamous for their tough conditions. AFP notes that temperatures in Perm can fall as low as -58° F in the winter. 

Pussy Riot tweeted that the camps were the “cruelest camps of any that could have been chosen," according to BBC. The art group Voina (i.e. War), which Tolokonnikova's husband belongs to, called Mordovia on Twitter “the worst prison hell there is," according to Reuters. 

Inna Bazhibina, who spent two years in a Russian detention center, told Radio Free Europe the Mordovia camps are some of the harshest in Russia given the area's climate, swamps, and mosquitoes.

"They say that there's always a problem with water [in Mordovia]. With water in general," Bazhibina said. "The girls [there] give up on hot water altogether. Why do they all have short hair? Because there's a problem with washing their hair. And how will you clean yourself? You have to use the kettle to heat water."

Former inmates told Radio Free Europe that Pussy Riot members will likely be subjected to unhealthy conditions and no privacy as cells can hold up to 40 women at a time. There's also a social hierarchy in which younger convicts are harassed, abused, and even raped by prison guards or other inmates.

Alyokhina, who has a 5-year-old son, and Tolokonnikova, who has a 4-year-old daughter, asked to serve out their sentences in Moscow or have them deferred until their children are 14, but those requests were denied.

The band members were convicted of "hooliganism motivated by religious hatred" after they performed a "punk prayer"  in Moscow's main cathedral on February 21. They will be released in March 2014.

SEE ALSO: MEMBERS OF PUSSY RIOT SENTENCED TO 2 YEARS IN JAIL >