Society of the Russian-Chechen Friendship

PRESS-RELEASE #429 FROM MAY 23, 2003

REPORT FROM THE CHECHEN REPUBLIC

Naur district. In Naur district Russian soldiers killed six innocent people

On May 21st 2003 in early morning in the settlement of Kalinovskaya, Naur district of the Chechen Republic, Russian soldiers murdered six local people including one woman and robbed their flats. The crime can be attributable to representatives of the federal enforcement structures as it is evidenced by the fact that the murderers arrived in APCs. Neither armed groups resisting the federal forces nor criminal groups have APCs at their disposal.

The head of the administration of the settlement of Kalinovskaya Kharon Aslidinovich Jabrailov and his deputy Said-Bek Shakhidov told a correspondent of the Informational Center of the Society for the Russian-Chechen Friendship about it. Said-Bek Shakhidov is the neighbor of the murdered people who eye-witnessed the crime. Some other witnesses have testified the case. According to them, they heard everything what was going on and they saw the soldiers through their windows but they were afraid to leave their flats.

According to eye-witnesses, at about 4 am four APCs and two grey "Ural"-cars with number plates covered in mud drove into the settlement. The APCs stopped at the edge of the settlement and the cars drove up to houses #2 and 3. First the criminals burst into flat #1 in house #3 and shot all the people dead - the head of the family Iduev Ramzan, his wife Idueva Zura, their son Iduev Idris and Zura's brother - Iduev Bakar. Their belongings were stolen from the flat: a videotape recorder, a TV set and a small sum of money, that the criminals found in the flat. Then the same soldiers killed Gadiev Aslambek and Islamov Turpal in flat №1 situated in house #2. The neighbors heard Islamov asking the soldiers who they were, why they burst into the flat and heard him demanding to show their documents from the soldiers. He was severely beaten, then the soldiers took him out of the house and shot him dead at his head.

Gadiev and Islamov's neighbors were lucky to escape death after the visit of the criminals. In Magomed-Salakh Kasuev's flat the soldiers bet his wife, Dagman Kasueva by name, who jumped out of bed being frightened by screams and the noise as the soldiers were breaking up their door. She grasped their seven-month-old daughter and was holding her in her hands when the soldiers burst into the flat. Her husband escaped the death as he managed to hide behind an arm-chair. The soldiers didn't find him. On bursting into the flat, the criminals demanded money and gold from Dagman. They took Dagman's daughter out of her hands, knocked the woman down, tied her arms behind her back, put a bag on her head, wrapped the bag round her head with scotch tape and started to search the room. One of the soldiers shouted to his mates, "These "chuchmecks" (an offensive word used by Russians to call people of other nationalities) usually keep their gold in their dinner-sets. Search there." Having searched the cupboard they took chinaware and a TV set.

Some 10 -15 minutes after leaving Kasuev's flat, the soldiers left the territory of the settlement. All of them were speaking Russian.

An infantry regiment, the commanding officer of which, colonel Alibek Aslambekov, comes from Dagestan, is dislocated at the distance of 120 meters from the place where the tragedy occurred. The head of the settlement administration Kharon Jabrailov said that the inhabitants of the settlement go on well with the soldiers of this military unit. The commander of this regiment doesn't allow his soldiers to roam round the settlement, he helps the administration with combustive-lubricating substances, gives transport to deliver money to the settlement from the district center, orders his soldiers to patrol the settlement together with the police office of the settlement. The head of the administration is sure that this crime can be attributable to the soldiers belonging to this regiment. Moreover, from the testimonies of the witnesses it is known that the APCs and the cars with the criminals drove into the settlement of Kalinovskaya through the blockposts located at the entrance to the settlement from the direction of the settlements of Nikolaevskaya and Chervlyonaya and after committing the crime they left it through the same blockposts. Unfortunately, the soldiers of the infantry regiment didn't help the inhabitants if the settlement although screams and gun-fire was heard all over the settlement. According to the head of the administration, at night time this unit defends themselves only.

On learning that the Society for the Russian-Chechen Friendship is making a report on the human rights abduction in Chechnya together with the Moscow-Helsinki Group and that the chairperson of the MHG Lyudmila Alekseeva is a member of the Human Rights Commission under the President of the Russian Federation, the deputy of the head of the administration Said-Bek Shakhidov told, "The president who is the Supreme Commander-in-Chief should know what his soldiers are committing here and he should do his best to make the life go in accordance with the law. After the referendum the number of murders, robberies and kidnapping committed by military men has increased all over the republic. The cases of bribery at blockposts have become more numerous. Putin must know that there are military units that obey nobody here and that violate justice unpunished. These are the legendary Military Intelligence Service, first of all, and some other special units. I personally think that they commit all the crimes and these are arbitrary detentions, unlawful executions and so on and so forth with one aim: to break the trust of the population to the Russian administration in Chechnya and to the president of the Russian Federation Putin personally before the coming elections. And we are here between the two fires: between the members of the armed resistance and the members of the federal forces". The majority of the settlement inhabitants who attended the funeral are of a different opinion. Some of them consider the only mentioning the name of the Russian president a case of blasphemy in this situation. "All these crimes are committed by his order and he knows perfectly well about everything that is going on here", - said many of those who came to the funeral and "tezet" (the ceremony to offer condolences to relatives of the dead). According to the local inhabitants, on May 21st, 2003 the NTV shooting group arrived at the settlement to make a TV story of the tragedy, they videotaped the place of the tragedy and witnesses but nothing has been broadcast.

The settlement where 6700 people live is in the deep mourning now. Naur district together with other South districts of the republic was considered one of the quietest in Chechnya. (From our correspondent).

Shali district. The details of one more forced detention in Shali

As it has become known, the group of the military men that on May 7th, 2003 attacked the Khaidarovs family and started fire at the prosecutor Karabin in Shali (see our reliz #419) and which is apparently responsible for a number of some other crimes committed in the town of Shali, on the same day committed a forced detention of two more local inhabitants, the Dagaevs brothers - Abu-Bakar (aged 34) and Sharip (aged 36). The military men detained them at the gates of their own house between 9.30 and 9.40 am and put them into an APC. From the testimonies of the victims, at the time of the attack at the Khaidarovs' house they were inside the APC and they heard everything that was going there at that time. Then they were taken outside the town and one of the invaders got through to somebody and told that they had got "good loot in Lenin Street". That man recommended the APC-crew to shoot the detainees dead over a walkie-talkie. The soldiers started to argue but the opinion prevailed not to commit a murder. After that the detained brothers Dagaevs were thrown out of the APC and they returned home. (From our correspondent).