Political crime in the Kalinovskaya settlement

May, 26 2003

On May, 21 at four o'clock in the Kalinovskaya settlement (Naursky district), six local people were killed.

The Kalinovskaya settlement - one of the main military bases of the Federal forces in the Chechen Republic. During the Soviet regime, an aviation training center as well as a military airstrip had been built there. Nowadays, there is the 42 division's infantry regiment, located in the Chechen Republic on a permanent basis, as well as the land troops'air force. The environs near the base, including the Kalinovskaya settlement, are thus highly controlled by the federal forces.

Early in the morning, two a/m UAZ-452 drove toward Iduyev Ramzan's house (7, Filatova Street), fifteen armed people came out wearing camouflage clothes. According to eyewitnesses, only four of them had masks on their face. The armed people burst into the house and shot everybody, who was there at that moment, except the one-year-old child. They killed: the house-owner Ramzan Iduyev, his wife Zura Bitiyeva, their son Idris Iduyev and Zura Bitiyeva's brother Abubakar
Bitiyev.

Eldard, Ramzan and Zura's other son, lived in the same yard, in a separate house. He woke up because of the noise and saw armed people running toward his parents' house. He quickly made his bed and hide himself behind an armchair. Two armed people then came into his room. They lighted it with a torch. Seeing that the bed was clean, one of them said to the other in Russian "it is empty, there is nobody here", after which they left the room taking along with them the video recorder. Eldard Iduyev waited until the armed people left his house and ran to his father's house where he found his brother, his uncle and his parents killed and his one-year-old child who was laying in puddle of blood, with his mouth taped, but still alive (the toddler slept together with Zura).

Within few minutes, the Iduyev's neighbors, who also saw the armed people, came to the house. According to them, four of the killers had masks on their face (they could be Chechens), however, most of the armed people did not have masks and therefore witnesses clearly saw that they were not Chechens. One of the neighbors told the employee of the Human Rights Center "Memorial" that before going to Iduyev's, the armed people had come to her, raised her from her bed and glued up her mouth. They then demanded her to show her passport. Seeing it, one of them watched her carefully and said, " It is not her". They took the passport and left the house. She found her passport at the Iduyev's near Zura Bitiyeva's dead body. In the same morning, the hypothetical same armed group killed Turpal Ismailov in his house (Kooperativnaya street) and another local inhabitant Islambek Gadiyev, shot in his house as well (Oktiabraskaya street).

Officials and investigation institutions of the Region did not express any assumption regarding the murderers. Local people think that the murderers clearly wanted to punish the Iduev's family. Zura Bitieva was well-known in Chechnya for having actively participated in antimilitary meetings and speeches during the first as well as the second war.

On January, 25 2000 Z.Bitiyeva had been taken into custody by the Russian soldiers for one month in the SIZO of Chernokosovo. After her release, she had been ill for a long time. She therefore had not participated in meetings against the military practices in violation of Human Rights in Chechnya. She addressed a complaint to the European Court in Strasbourg regarding the Russian military practices. In the beginning of February 2003 Z.Bitiyeva had been part of the group of women that demand the opening of the burial place discovered near the Kapustino settlement (Naursky region).

In the middle of March 2003, in the Uzlovaia station (Shelkovsky region) policemen arrested Idris Iduyev and Abubakar Bitiyev for having in possession illegal drugs. The policemen put in their pockets small packets of unidentified substances. Z. Bitiyeva thus accused the policemen of forgery and tried to prove it. She spoke to
the authorities of the region and clearly stated the forgery against her relatives. As a result, one of the policemen in the capacity of witness regarding this case, hit her on the face. Zura Bitiyeva had not said this fact to her family in order not to aggravate the situation avoiding eventual replies from her close relatives. In the beginning of May, the trial began: I.Iduyev and A. Bitiyev had been accused of having in possession narcotics without dealing purposes, [and sentenced] to one year of probation.

We must notice that Zura Bitiyeva is the second victim among those who had dared, in different times, to complain to the Court of Strasbourg. Earlier, Saeed Mogamed Imakaev, inhabitant of Noviye-Atagi (Shalinsky region-Chechen Republic) had been taken away from his house and had disappeared. He had complained to the court against the Russian soldiers who had kidnapped his son.